Reality Crisis

Selina's time in this newly, relocated part of the world had been short. She hadnt yet ventured from the house she had to herself to explore for fear of not knowing what was out there. In Sanctuary there had been a protective wall around them to keep things out. And now there was nothing here to separate them from what was unknown. The Cat really didn't care too much for those odds. Especially considering her power and skills were limited in this world. She only had guns and swords to keep herself safe, and even then who said anything out beyond here could even die by those things?

Those snow dinosaurs had. They had gotten lucky, but what else might pop up unannounced and try to eat all of them? Selina wasn't too keen on waiting around to find out.

That and she was going a bit stir crazy in the house by herself. In Gotham she at least had a circle of people to go to if she needed company, The Bat included, but here she was more or less on her own. Since Jonathan was gone Selina found herself to hold a void she didn't know she had been capable of possessing. And she wasn't used to that.

Usually she got what she wanted with little to no effort but it was different here. She couldn't stand it either.

Selina sighed heavily and stood facing the outside, her back to the city. Her blue eyes swept the area around and her ears were unable to pick up anything out of the ordinary. At one hip settled the holster for a gun, and another was wrapped around the upper thigh of the opposite side. Her trusty whip was curled around her waist, and she stood there impatiently with her hands on her hips, waiting for anyone else whom might be out and about, either joining in the patrol or simply out wandering.

Company was company. She wasn't going to be too picky at this point. Even Dinah would do as far as ideal for conversation. Of course she would've preferred the Bat, but she would take what she could get.

The entire group was halfway through their journey across the wilds when all hell broke loose, in a quite literal fashion. The temperature dropped quickly and snow started to fall at an alarming rate. On one end of the caravan, reality burst at the seams.

One of the trucks disappeared into the hole and the rest of the vehicles just barely stopped short. The ground started to vibrate and suddenly a loud roar could be heard nearby. A gigantic white mass moved from the direction of the hole in reality and started stomping around the caravan. Meanwhile, mounds of snow started forming into even more creatures that converged on the group and their supply trucks.

The largest of the creatures roared again, revealing a full set of snow-white teeth. The mounds of snow formed into dinosaurs that were about half the size of the largest dinosaur, ranging from the large Tyrannosaurus Rex formed out of snow to the smaller and faster Velociraptors.

A few screams rose up from the group below as people started to run in an attempt to avoid finding out if snow-dinosaurs could and would ingest them.

OOC: Just a little holiday crack!plot for you. Join in, create subthreads, and enjoy!

Most people didn't return to the building after the dragon started using the roof for a bed. Which meant that Sam had no way of knowing where his wife, his brother, or Cas were. Buildings and people had disappeared. Entire chunks of the city that had been a safe haven for them. It didn't sit well and he was fighting off panic as he looked.

He couldn't help but think that things had been too good before this had happened. Perhaps he'd gotten complacent. Perhaps he'd forgotten who he was for a little while. Forgotten that Winchesters weren't supposed to get happy endings. Particularly not the Winchester who had brought on the apocalypse and done so many things that were unconscionable. It didn't matter what his original intentions had been. As he'd once told Dean, it wasn't the road to Heaven that was paved with good intentions.

He finally decided to check some of the likely haunts for Fred and Dean, starting with the garage. If his brother was anywhere, it would be making sure that the Impala hadn't been swallowed up by one of the holes in reality.

Evey heard it, first - the sounds of dismay rising from 7 floors below. A clamor echoed in her head at almost the same time - not from her, but from her best friend, struggling through wave after wave of panic that was not his own. No.... some of it was his. Leeloo. The name was a sharp need, a crushing helplessness reverberating. Evey went to the window and looked down, watched the world change, watched a mythological creature emerge to threaten the people of die Festung. And where had the buildings gone, and where were the ones who had inhabited them before?

"Buildings just disappeared," she said to Peter silently, swallowing down her own immediate fear as her thoughts flew in the direction of New Troy. "There's a dragon. It may be happening there in New Troy. I'm going now, to find him. Leeloo, is she okay?" And then, because she couldn't stop from asking, "... Can you reach Aidan...?"

She felt sluiced in ice water, her mind clicking into survival mode. Close down emotion. Focus on the important things. Move. Move. Evey did. Her body began preparing for a journey, and she felt as if she were watching herself do it. Pull out a knapsack. Push three shirts inside. One extra pair of heavy trousers. That lockpick set. A knife in its makeshift sheath. A box of matches. A small pot with insulated handles. A roll of cloth bandages. A day's worth of food - one strange fruit, a hunk of bread, fresh water in an old thermos that still sealed shut.

Peter was trying to shield her from what he was feeling. Fragments of emotion were skipping through, more and more as time ticked, and the sheer overwhelming panic she felt in jolts and starts was getting to her despite herself. She kept her eyes straight ahead. She moved with an efficiency both smooth and cold. But when she tied a jacket around her waist and swung the knapsack over her shoulder, her hands were shaking. At last, his voice:

DRAGON!
yes, it's a dragon, I heard it the first dozen times
Evey?
stopstopstoptooloudtheyreallfeelingittooloud
Evey? Aidan is there, think he's okay. Can't get in touch, too--

The panic that came then was enough to knock her against the wall before Peter checked it -- at least for her. Then, his thoughts filtered back again, as Evey locked the door to her flat.

too much.

Her hands stung with the phantom bite of nails in her palms. She flexed her hands, felt the tugging of her hair -- his hair...

Leeloo -- okay. At Sanctuary.

Evey leaned against the outside door of her flat and stared at the ceiling, feeling ashamed for the relief that Aidan was still alive, while Peter slowly deconstructed. She turned around and unlocked the door again. "Where are you, Peter? I'm coming. I'll be right there - I'll be right there. Tell me where you are -- I can't see you through all that."

stillwiththedragonitsJUSTADRAGONALREADYSHUTUP
Tried.. Not at Sanctuary. Not sure...

There came then a gentle sense of tugging, guiding her in one direction, amidst a cacophony of panicking voices, too many to hear anything distinct. Evey focused keenly on it.

Follow?

And she would have followed Peter anywhere, when he sounded just like that. She dumped out the shirts from her knapsack, ran to the kitchen, and threw as much food as could easily be carried into it instead. "I'm coming."

She ran down the stairs, and threw herself into the lobby, heading for the door. The momentum nearly crashed her into one of her former neighbors -- the newly-wed Fred.

"Sorry --" Evey rubbed her eyes, held out her hands. "Sorry... Fred." FRED. A thought twisted her attention straight back to the woman. "Help me."

Thankfully nothing came of the rustling. Fred would never say it, but she certainly thought it: something had been out there, but it seemed to be respectful of the moment. At least that moment anyway. No one stuck around to see if there was really something to fight.

Fred didn't force anyone to come to the party the brief yet very important ceremony - important to her anyway. She did mention that everyone was invited to come to a small reception back in the small town. Belia had been nice enough to give some local wine she'd been keeping; she understood as much as anyone that a wedding was a step in healing, even if it was a wedding among the Chosen. Dean had found a few bottles of hooch that wouldn't kill anyone's stomach, probably.

Fred hadn't mentioned that the card with the bottles of wine had also said something about the future, heavily implying children. While she thought Sam would have beautiful children, she wasn't ready for whatever large creature he would spawn inside her. The thought about it actually made her laugh and wince; she knew a good bit of his past after all.

She'd gotten a few donations of food and sweets to fill the stomachs of any guests. She didn't mind if anyone came from off the street. She'd even found a stringed instrument that looked like a guitar and someone to play it! So, it wasn't overly fancy or big, but it would do.

Now all the party needed was party people. She hoped people came and enjoyed themselves.

Back home, weddings might have taken months of planning and putting things together. Sam didn't much care for the idea of waiting. Not in a world that could just as easily rain death on you at a moment's notice. He loved Fred and he wanted to marry her.

She'd asked for a wedding in the fairy forest and while Sam didn't love that idea, she had a point about getting married somewhere that still looked alive and mostly untouched by the devastation that was everywhere you looked in this world.

They weren't too far in the forest. Just far enough in that they couldn't see the ruins, but not so far that they were in the very heart of faerie territory.

Sam had managed to scrounge up clean clothes that were nicer than his every day clothes. He hadn't found a suit, but he did have a nice button-up shirt, a jacket, and some slacks. Some of the locals had been excited to give clothes that had long since been forgotten in closets because they weren't practical. Weddings were a happy occasion and die Festung didn't get to see enough happiness.

Sam thought it was nice that even amidst all of the destruction, life still went on. That was why this day was important. Even if legal marriages weren't a thing anymore. Even if this was a symbolic ceremony, it was still important.

He loved Fred and he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. Even if the rest of his life was only a few more days or years, and even if it might be decades. He thought that it was important to stop and acknowledge that and celebrate it. Because this was the sort of thing that made it all worth fighting for.

Sam tugged at his collar as he stood in between Dean and Cas and waited for Fred to make her appearance. There was a little case of nerves as he worried that maybe the bride would have second thoughts and wouldn't show. He did his best to dismiss that paranoia and watched the small opening in the trees for any sign of his future bride.

Sam still hadn't figured out what had caused Fred's outburst. Though it was starting to become more clear as stories filtered in about other people going completely off the rails. Not that he'd say that to her, but he'd heard a few things about people acting completely out of character. Still, he was treading lightly and didn't want to be the one to bring up the wedding as he waited around for Fred to wake up. She'd fainted in the middle of reaming him out over... well, truthfully he wasn't even sure what she'd been so angry about at the moment.

Maybe it was nerves but maybe it was whatever had affected the others.

Sam paced beside Fred's bed while he waited for her to awake. He was as worried about the personality shift and what else it could mean as he was about her health at the moment. Anything that could affect someone's personality like that couldn't be good for you.

Though if by some chance, it was just wedding-related nerves? Well, he supposed that the sooner they got the wedding part over with, the better. Not that he'd voice that to her of course.

The earthquake had been over for days. die Festung was in poor shape, and Sam was busy helping with the clean-up. But slowly, things started to look a little better. Slowly, it got to a point where his mind could turn to other things.

He didn't want a long engagement. Especially with this most recent reminder of their mortality. If Fred, Dean, and Cas agreed, he'd marry Fred tomorrow if he could. He respected that she might want more of a ceremony than one could throw together in a day, maybe. Maybe not, since she didn't seem the girly girl type when it came to those things.

Truthfully, the only thing Sam cared about was who he was marrying and having his brother at his side as he did so. All other details were up to Fred.

After a long day of assisting in rebuilding the wall, he sought her out. She'd been off helping out as well of course. They all had their own skillsets and ways to contribute after this latest disaster. But it was dinner time now, which meant that he was looking for his fiancee.

Sam had spent the last couple of weeks sneaking into the lab when Fred wasn't in there to work with metal on a ring for her. He knew that she probably wasn't the jewelry type, but he also wanted to do that tradition for her. He wanted something tangible for her to wear.

So when the ring was finished, Sam headed back to the Chosen building as he mentally tried to figure out how best to present the ring to his fiancee.

Fiancee. There was a word that he never would have thought he'd have a reason to use.

Sam didn't have too long to wander down that line of thinking as he reached the door to the building and the ground started to shake. The building quivered and then the shaking became more violent. The ring that was in his pocket forgotten, Sam took off at a sprint up the stairs.

"Fred?" He shouted. "Dean? Cas?"

He needed to make sure that they were all okay. And he was pretty sure that getting out of the building or at least finding somewhere that was safer was the best thing to do right now.

Fred was starting to wonder if this was how it was always going to be. She would worry about the hunter boyfriend, and he would come back in bits and pieces. Some part of her thought it was romantic, but another small part wondered if maybe there was a better way to go about all this. There had to be, maybe one that didn’t end up with her boyfriend covered in his own blood. Other people’s blood as long as it wasn’t family or friends was okay with her, sort of.

She’d paced back and forth in the lobby, never roaming too far, just in case. Then when they showed up, she'd smiled. Dean had told her about Aidan, a living Aidan, or an undead one who wasn't dust. Well, that was a step in the right direction - if Aidan had been to help. She had helped get Sam back to their apartment, and she had let Dean play the part of big brother, for a little while anyway; she’d needed to go to the gate to talk to Aidan. Aidan told her what she needed to know, and she'd do her best to follow his directions because he was a proper nurse after all. Soon, she returned to shove Dean out, with the promise that she'd let him visit again soon; Dean had to get rest as much as Sam did.

Fred sat quietly beside the bed as Sam rested. They were lucky that Aidan had been around, for more reasons than one apparently. She had managed to find a comfortable spot, curled up on the chair. Her hand rested near Sam’s, and she’d slipped into a doze. She would be there when he woke up. She had a bottle of water and crackers nearby. See? She could look after a hunter.

( ----- )

(Continued from here.)

"Yeah, their mom, mother," Dean turned just in time to see one thing he never wanted to see again. Certainly not this way. Not as it took his little brother off. He moved quickly to pick up the flare gun, but he knew the damn beast moved too quickly for a shot to work. He needed to get it in its hole. Of course, knowing this didn't help anything. He also knew what Sam would see and feel. He knew what would happen back in the Wendigo's lair, cave, whatever the hell it would be call.

Calling for Castiel wasn't a bad idea at the moment, but what could the angel do? Plus, Dean and Sam had faced this thing down before. He could find it and kill it. He could handle it on his own. He would find his missing brother.

There was a small nagging at the back of his head. It told him that he couldn't do this. He couldn't save Sam; this was how he lost his little brother. This was why those little girls were named after dead men. This had to be it. This was when he lost the last of his blood relatives.

"Son of a bitch." The hunter growled, set his shoulders, and started in the direction he believed the Wendigo would go. There were rumors of large buildings with adequate basements. By now, the places probably resembled caves. That or there were some caves, underground, in the forest. Either way, he'd find Sam, and he'd save him. Sam would get to know his nieces, dammit.

Fred had let Sam sleep, and she had every intention of speaking with Dean. Every single intention to give that hard headed jerk a piece of her mind. Only that didn't happen. Instead, she cleaned up the apartment downstairs, putting things away. She didn't stay there long though; she needed to do something productive that didn't remind her of failing. Failing in putting her mind to it.

She flopped again at the workbench. The room was warmer now that she'd set up a heater in the corner; it was a simple burning stove with a few Fredly additions to make it more the whole place, and she'd managed to swing some nice smelling wood to burn. There she sat staring at the most recent victim of her curiosity.

"Don't worry, I'll make you better." That was the plan, only that was not what happened.

( She woke... )

Sam's frustration with how stubborn Dean could be carried him up to the seventh floor and to the door of the studio apartment that he'd been calling home these days. He let himself in and stopped at the sight of several boxes on the ground.

"Fred?" Sam called out, eyes scanning the small space for his girlfriend. Or at least, he hoped that she was still his girlfriend and wasn't moving out without telling him.

He moved over to the refrigerator and searched for something frozen-ice, food, whatever. He found a few chips of ice and then found a towel to wrap them in.

"We need more space...because he's really big, and we could be closer to his brother without being on top of his brother." Fred's arms were full as she walked up the stairs to her floor. "No, that sounds like we're trying to do something dirty. It's not like I can mention Dean's other lodger. Probably shouldn't talk about him anyway. I mean what if someone hears, that could really start trouble. Pretty sure they don't want that getting out. Then again, pretty sure you shouldn't be talking to yourself."

The brainy Texan shifted the box with gadgets and doodads galore and tried to get at her keys. She thought she had them in one had, but seemed she had them in the wrong hand. Sure, she could open the door with either hand, but it was easier a certain way.

"You're nervous." She sighed, finally giving in and putting the box down on the ground to work the lock and key without little hinderance. "So, talk to yourself. It only really is something to worry about when someone hears you. Then again, you could say you're practicing, which is what you're doing." She nodded the groaned. "I'm. It's what I'm doing."

Fred wished that Sam was around, but she wanted to do this for him. They'd decided to get another apartment, one better suited for everything that was Fred and Sam, and she wanted to have it ready or at least acquired before he got back from the hunting trip. She had no idea how long he would be away, but she could do something more than just dream about a slightly larger place that would give him a room for his library and her more table space for her projects. It wasn't too much to ask was it?

Fred didn’t pace. She didn’t even chew on her lip or scribble distractedly in one of her many notebooks. Sam wouldn’t just leave her. Sure, it happened, but he wouldn’t do that. Plus, when she last saw him, he was being whisked away by Cas. Things could be very bad, but he wouldn’t die without letting her know somehow. Maybe.

Instead of worrying too much over it, she decided to work on one of the smaller engines she’d found. She’d lugged, shoving it in a closet for when it was okay to pull out and work on. Taking things apart and putting them back together was calming, so that was what she did. It didn’t look as crazy as the other things she might do.

Her nose wrinkled as she wiped down one of the pieces. The build up was certainly not from a petroleum based fuel, and the ignition system...it was different. It wasn’t purely electrical, but it wasn’t what they were used to. The liquid burned like diesel, but it felt almost like gasoline. The parts of the engine were lighter than those in even the gasoline engines she knew back home. It didn’t make any sense at all.

( ---- )

Sam was doing better these days though he still had his nights where the nightmares would become too much. On those nights, he wandered. Sometimes he stayed in the city, but sometimes he ventured outside the walls and did what he could to pick off some of the creatures that might be trying to get in. While he knew that there were safeguards around the wall, they could never be too safe. He didn’t trust the walls to keep the monsters out forever. And more than that, any monsters outside the walls could be a threat to those who might need to go outside the walls. Or for those who would arrive in this world without any awareness of where they were or what was happening.

On this particular night, Sam ran across a nasty pack of wolves that seemed supernaturally strong. Perhaps they were werewolves or some other sort of shifts, or maybe they were just super-charged wolf-type creatures. Whatever the case, he had won the fight but was worse off for it.

The wolves were dead and Sam set fire to the bodies. While the pelts might be able to provide warmth to those within the walls, they might also carry some sort of supernatural hocus pocus-a curse or some other sort of nastiness. He couldn’t take that risk.

Once the job was thoroughly done, he limped back to the wall and passed the guards. He made it back to the apartment and let himself in. There were angry red gashes that had sliced through his outerwear, his shirt and right down to the flesh underneath. Blood had matted around the tears in the fabric. His lip was bloodied and he was limping due to an ankle that might have been sprained. He didn’t think that anything was broken, but he was hoping that Fred was home to look him over just in case.

( Just a little TLC )

There was music. She could hear music ahead up ahead in the center of town, and she could feel the cold nipping at her nose and bare fingertips. She liked the pinch of it on her cheeks. This was weather she got on occasion in Pylea, and oddly those cold harsh nights were some of her more favorite because they didn’t hunt humans then. They weren’t easy nights, but they had been hers.

“Will you dance with me, Mr. Winchester?” She peeked up at him, smiling. Yes, Fred was in a damn good mood. She smiled up at her boyfriend. “Maybe they have hot cider or cocoa? Or elephant ears.” Yes, her mind did often times go straight to food.

“Didn’t get much of this in LA or Texas. Kind of fun.” She giggled, fingers tightening on his. She was bundled as best she could be; the clothes didn’t fit perfectly, but they allowed for layering. Part of her was more than excited to see how long it would take him to get her out of them. While she’d been getting ready, she actually had mumbled something about tootsie pops and licks to the center.

“Did y’all see a lot of snow?” She tugged at him almost like a kid who wanted to get somewhere faster. Almost.

( ---- )

Fred looked at the pile of bits and pieces in front of her. She was trying to rebuild a generator, or more redesign one. She’d taken a few apart and put them back together just fine. She knew how they worked, the simpler ones, and she thought she could make one of her own with the right pieces. Only...only she couldn’t get things to go together like she wanted.

She’d been absent from her apartment for a while. She’d actually let Sam know that she would be sleeping down in her “lab” for a bit because he was more distracting than he could know. As soon as they were back to “normal,” Fred had reminded him why she was cool to be around, or maybe she reminded herself. The angel was cool, but he wasn’t the one for her. Not that they’d done anything, but her feelings for Sam could explain why she kept her apartment door open. No parents meant no need to keep doors open and all that. Only, she’d felt very sure that she should keep the door open, and that she shouldn’t get too chummy with the angel. And that somewhere she had a boyfriend, which was more than a little amusing because Fred had never had a boyfriend before.

She’d been considering going to find Sam; she’d interrupted something possibly serious with a kiss when he came home earlier, all grown up - very grown up. She’d kept him busy, and they both seemed to enjoy it. So, she was about to set off to find him, when look who showed up with a slight frown - he’d been thinking or brooding - and a bag of edibles. Not wanting to wait for food or for serious, she preempted the talking with another very good long kiss. Yes, she did like remembering that she had a boyfriend, her very own Sam.

( ---- )

Castiel wandered through the streets of die Festung, visible to all and taking in the sights from as human a perspective as he could. Since he'd moved in with Dean he'd decided to try to act more like a resident of the City, instead of teleporting from outlook to outlook like he was used to. Belia and her guards could do nothing to him, really, so what was he worried about?

He noticed a few people walking around with what looked like granola bars. He paused, wondering why he hadn't seen them around before, and quickly located a vendor who was distributing them. With Dean's encouragement he'd been trying more different foods, never taking too much (since he didn't technically need it) but enjoying the experimentation.

Without asking he was handed a bar, and he looked at it. The wrapper promised energy, and that wasn't necessarily a bad thing, was it?

Walking a few steps away to avoid the crowd Castiel opened the bar and tasted the snack. It wasn't bad, and he finished the entire bar quickly, disposing of the wrapper in a nearby trash bin. He made it almost a full ten feet before an odd sensation swept over him.

For a moment he thought it might be the energy the bar promised, but before he could even really debunk that with the argument that as an angel physically he was incapable of being affected by so small an amount... something changed. He barely noticed, and all of a sudden he certainly didn't care.

He looked around, suddenly noticing a group of boys kicking around an old ball in a clearing. He hesitated just a moment, then jogged over, stopping and breathlessly watching them for a moment.

When they noticed him they stopped as well, and one of the older boys (he couldn't be much older than Cas was himself, right?), smirked. "What d'ya want, old man?" he asked. The others laughed. Cas frowned, confused. He wasn't old. Well, ok, maybe he was... but not really. Not just because of his vessel, right?

"Can... can I play?" he asked hesitantly. The initial mocking was hindering his earlier enthusiasm, and he felt nervous. What if they didn't like him? What if they didn't want him to play, thinking he was stupid or incapable or ugly somehow?

"Can you, in all that?" the boy retorted with a laugh, then turned and resumed the game. Cas blinked in confusion at the answer, and his hands went to his chest and he looked down, at the coats, the nice shirt, the tie and the shoes... everything. Why was he wearing so much?

The angel shrugged off his trench coat, then the suit jacket, pulling off his tie and then the white button up and carelessly dumping them on the ground in a pile. Now only dressed in a short sleeved undershirt, his pants, and dress shoes, the angelic youth jogged into the game, soon laughing aloud with the rest as he played keep away with the other boys.

The library hunt had gone by very quickly. Though in some ways, it had seemed to take too long while they all waited to see what their fate would be. Sam had been scared, very scared for everyone for a time there. Luckily, he had been able to keep his head straight even when faced with the flames that threatened to overtake all of them.

It was only afterward that he wanted to collapse in exhaustion. Instead, once he and Fred had made it back to her place, he grabbed her and pulled her into a tight embrace. He didn’t want to let go anytime soon. He might have lost her today. That reality had been ever-present in his mind, but now it was over and she was still here. In spite of the demon deal and the hunt, she was still here.

He found comfort in that. She’d become a lifeline to him in so many ways as he’d struggled with the memories brought about by taking down the wall.