"If the demon tablet shuts the gates of hell, what can the angel tablet do?" "I can't let you take that, Dean." "I know I have to protect this tablet." " From Naomi?" " And from you." "From me?" "What are you talking about?" " Cass." "Damn it." " My name is Naomi." "I know." "And I know what you did to Cass after Purgatory." "They're controlling us, Castiel." "And now Castiel is in the wind with a hydrogen bomb in his pocket." "God built a series of tests." "When you do all three, you can slam the gates." " The second trial?" " An innocent soul has to be rescued from hell and delivered unto heaven." "Aah!" "It's done." "Second trial hit you a lot harder than that first one." " He's in my head, Dean." " The fear, the hiding." "And if he's in my head, he knows where I am." "Thought you could elude me forever?" " He's gone." " Little geek made a run for it." "Yeah, but where?" "Kevin." "Come on, it's us." "Open up." "We're bleeding out here." "Come on, man." "It's me." " Now it's wet me." " You forgot the knock." "What's the point if you don't use it?" "Sorry, Kevin." "We got it." "Got what?" "We caught a tip that Crowley was moving his Earth-side operations so we, uh, laid ourselves an awesome trap." " And it worked." "We got the other half of the tablet." "What?" "It's the light at the end of your tunnel, kid." "Don't say we never got you nothing." "Holy crap." "Are you kidding?" "We can get the third trial." "We can finally figure out how to close the gates of hell on Crowley's ass forever." "Sounds good to me." "We digging up the other half of that thing or what?" "Don't need to." "So, uh, ahem, Special K, you keep your nose to the God-stone." "We're gonna drive out and make a lot of noise a long way from here, keep the safe boat safe for you." "We'll be back as soon as we can, okay?" "I guess he's okay." "All right." "Don't forget to lock up after us." "So it's three trials." "Three trials and the Winchesters get to lock the door on me." "Ha!" "You, fake Sam if you're gonna tip our hand I'll have to scrub Kevin's short-term memory again and that's risky." "So watch the patois in there." "Patois?" "Your slang." ""Special K", "nose to the God-stone." That's the way Dean speaks." "Sam is more basic, more sincere." "Remember, I want two distinct, authentic characterizations." "Yes, sir." "I was born to direct." "All right, here we go." "John Winchester's famous cure-all kitchen-sink stew." "There you go." "Enough cayenne pepper in there to burn your lips off, like Dad used to make." "You want me to do the whole, uh, airplane thing with the spoon?" "When was the last time you ate?" " I don't..." " Days, Sam." "It's been three days." "When did you get that?" "When did you start throwing off heat waves?" " Here." " Enough." "Dean, please." "The bloody handkerchiefs, the fever, the shaky legs, this is not good." "Well, I'm not good and I'm not going to be good until we can start moving again until I can start the third trial." "Trial?" "I wouldn't let you start a moped." "We're on the rails with this thing, okay?" "And the only way out of it is through it believe me, I know." "And you know how bad I wanna slam the door on all those sons of bitches." "But you gotta let me take care of you, man." "You gotta let me help you get your strength back." "This isn't a cold or a fever or whatever it is you're supposed to feed." "This is part of it all." "Those first two trials, they're not just things I did." "They're doing something to me." "They're changing me, Dean." " It's Kevin." " Finally." "Sam, Dean I set up this message with some software and a remote server so it'd send itself if I didn't reset it with a command once a week." "Which means I didn't reset it this week." "And there's only one reason I wouldn't." "Which means if you're watching this, then I..." "Then I'm dead." "I'm dead, you bastards!" "So screw you, screw God and everybody in between!" "Crowley must have gotten to me and the one thing I know is that I won't break this time." "I'm not sure how I know, but I do." "I've been uploading all my notes and translations." "I'm sending you the links so you can get all of it." "You guys are gonna have to try to figure out the rest." "I'm sorry." "I know it was my job, but I couldn't..." "I'm sorry." "Damn it!" "Yeah." "I know you haven't seen him, Keel." "Nobody has." "All right, well, if you talk to Garth, just have him call in." " Yeah." " Garth still MIA?" "Yeah." "How about the other prophets in line?" "I mean, if Kevin is, uh..." "Is dead, then won't one of them be activated?" "Nothing." "No, not a peep." "Here we are, no lead, no tablet, squat." "Well, I mean, we got all this." "We should have moved him here." "I guess I've been acquiring the taste." "Yeah, the coffee's not too bad here." "You know, I remember when you first discovered it." "Before you started brewing it, you'd just chew the berries." "Folktale is true, by the way." "You learned it from the goats." "Been on the road a long time, huh?" "Feels like I've been on the run forever." "Um, I'm sorry, mister, but you're gonna have to order more than coffee if you wanna keep the table." " Of..." "Of course." "Um..." "I'll have the smart-heart beer-battered tempura tempters." "Of course." "Coming right up." "They're getting closer." "What's that, chief?" "I swear to God, Lance, the guy just disappeared." "You on the crack again, Perry?" "Ion, tell me that you have good news." "He's using a clever tactic." "It's a restaurant called Biggerson's." "Humans have built hundreds almost exactly alike." " What are you talking about?" " It's their sameness." "Castiel is using it against us." "We try to orient ourselves, but it's as if we're in every Biggerson's trapped in a quantum superposition." "Now, he chooses which to go to next, that's what's giving him the edge." "You're saying that you can't catch him?" "There's just so many Biggerson's." "Very well." "You say he can't be caught." "Then we will simply have to make him stop." "Hm." " There it is again, every time." " Hm?" "This symbol, I know it." "Now, Kevin has it down as sort of like a signature for the scribe of God." "It appears every time Metatron makes one of his, uh, like, editor's notes." "Okay." "But I think I've seen it before." "It was a long time ago." "It was one of my, uh, humanities courses at Stanford." "They taught word of God at Stanford?" "No, uh, it was an overview of Native American art." "I think it's a petroglyph." "A petro-what-now?" "This one belonged to a tiny tribe in Colorado." "More of a clan, really." "It says here they held onto their scrap of mountains when all the other tribes fell to the white man." "So this glyph was a territorial marker." "Closest translation, "Messenger of God."" "Messenger of God." "Messenger of God." "Dean, we have to go there." "On that hunch?" "You can barely function." "I'm only gonna get worse." "I mean, until I get back to the real job, until we find the third trial." "We're out of prophets." "We're not gonna figure out what Kevin couldn't." "I say we go to this messenger of God who wrote it in the first place." "And you think that this Metatron is hiding out in the mountains with a bunch of Indians?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I do." "You're not really supposed to say "Indians," it's..." "We should go." "You are delirious." "You have to stop." "They said you have to stop." "No." " They said you have to stop." " No." " To stop." "You have to stop." " No." " You have to stop." "They said you have to stop." "You have to stop." "Nice place." "Morning." "Hi." "Uh, we'd like a room." "Here, please." "Did you hear that?" "Hear what?" "He has the flu." "You have to stop." "You have to stop." "They said..." "Aah!" "Ah." "Can't hear myself think." "We were supposed to be their shepherds, not their murderers." "Not always, angel." "There was that day back in Egypt not so long ago where we slew every firstborn infant whose door wasn't splashed with lamb's blood." "And that was just PR." "Well, I wasn't there." "Oh, you were there." "You just don't remember it." "How?" "How many times have you torn into my head and washed it clean?" "Frankly, too damn many." "You're the famous spanner in the works." "Honestly, I think you came off the line with a crack in your chassis." "You have never done what you were told not completely." "You don't even die right, do you?" "Where is the angel tablet, Castiel?" "In the words of a good friend bite me." "Oh, we'll bite." "Don't worry." "Go." "Search all these Biggerson's." "He must have hidden it along the way." "I can barely see." "I need food." "All right." ""Barbecue ribs, mashed potatoes..."" "Garlic mashed potatoes." ""Garlic mashed potatoes, mixed greens with baby lettuce cornbread and, uh, pad thai."" "Garth says there's a good little place on the other side of town." "What the hell?" "Kid's been working hard." " Those guys aren't half bad." " No, sir." "You chose well." "Of course, if I wasn't running everything, I could have played Dean myself." "Oh, you would have made a great Dean, sir." "Regular tourist mecca we got here." "We're the only guests in this whole place." "Last entry in the registry was in '06." "Hey, you remember when, uh..." "When dad took us to the bottom of the Grand Canyon on that pack-mule ride?" " The what?" " And your, uh..." "Your mule kept farting just letting go, like gale force." "Dude, you were like 4 years old." "I barely remember that." "Ah..." "You rode a farty donkey." "Okay." "Uh, I'm gonna go check out the Two Rivers Travel Museum and Trading Post." "Yeah, yeah." "I'm gonna..." "I'm gonna, um..." "I'm gonna follow the hotel manager, Dr. Scowley-Scowl." "He's like a villain from Scooby-Doo." "No, hey, uh, Little Big Man, you should get some rest." "Yeah, I can do that too." "The people of the Two Rivers tribe came to this land centuries ago a land that was harsh and stony." "But their mighty leader told his people that they must stay here." "He claimed that this was the home on Earth of the Great Spirit's sacred messenger and that if they made offerings, their blessings would be many." " What were the offerings?" " Huh?" "Uh, what did the Great Spirit's sacred messenger ask for?" "Stories." "He asked the people to tell him stories." "I bet I know what the blessings were." "Sam?" "I've been all over them." "It's not there." "Why?" "Why are you doing this?" "Let us put the tablet back where it should be." " I need to protect it." " From the angels?" "From all of us." "I'm just going to have to pull you apart, aren't I?" "Naomi, darling." "Miss me?" " Get off." "What the hell?" " Take it easy, Sam." "Aah!" "Hey." "Whoa, whoa." "Take it easy." "Take it..." "Ah." "Found you on the floor, passed out." "Your temperature was 107." "I had to force it down, or you were toast." "He's here, Dean." "Metatron is here." "I know it." "I can hear him." " What are you talking about?" " All I know is that I'm connected to it somehow." "What, like you got a link to him, like a prophet?" "I don't know." "I just know he's here." "Metatron is here." "Okay." "Here where?" "I can show you." "I can show you." "The manager he was delivering books to him." " Books?" " Books." "Hardcovers, paperbacks, novels, books." "Stories." "Do you like it?" "I had my RD people melt down one of your angel blades cast it into bullets." "Seems to do the trick." "How dare you." "I am the daringest devil you've ever met, love." "We've been here before, haven't we?" "Let's see who blinks first." "Hm." "Hi, Cass." "That's right, Cass." "I got me an angel on the payroll." "It's that kind of universe these days." "Heh." "Now grab him and follow me." "Hey, kid, you okay?" "I can't, all right?" "It's the break in the stone." "There's key writing." "I can't make it out." "You guys were right." "I do need the other half of the tablet to get the trial." "It's not too far from here." "Awesome." "Uh..." "Well, what's the 10-20?" "Just wanted to take a moment away from the main action, ha to chat with my old business partner." "I assume you won't die just yet." "Takes a painful long time to bleed out from the gut." "You can do whatever you want, Crowley." "I will never tell you where I buried the tablet." "I know, Cass." "I know." "Luckily I don't believe you have to." "I've been getting regular updates from my expensive friend here." "Naomi should have caught you seeing as lately, she's been knuckles deep in that melon of yours." "She thinks that your touching the tablet has broken her spell over you." "Mm?" "The tablets weren't meant for the angels and they weren't meant for you." "She's got a lot on her plate, so you can't fault her for missing it." "I was thinking to myself, "Self if Cass got away from her by touching the tablet why would he ever stop touching the tablet?"" "And then I thought to myself:" ""Self he hasn't stopped touching the tablet, now, has he?"" "Oh, you're a pip, you are." "Heh-heh." "What?" "This is the king." "The kid told us where the other half was, but it wasn't." "Dab of crap tricked us sent us into some kind of hunter mousetrap." "You jackasses." "You're ruining my streak." "Watch him." "I'll be right back." "I should be taking you to the ER." "They can't do anything for me." "You know, I've been remembering things little things, so clearly..." "What, donkey rides?" "You used to read to me, um, when I was little." "I mean, really little, from that old, uh Classics Illustrated comic book." "You remember that?" "No." "Knights of the Round Table." "King Arthur's knights were all on the quest for the Holy Grail." "And I remember looking at this picture of Sir Galahad and he was kneeling and light streaming over his face." "And I remember thinking, uh I could never go on a quest like that because I'm not clean." "I mean, I was just a little kid." "You think maybe I knew?" "I mean, deep down that I had demon blood in me and about the evil of it and that I wasn't pure?" "Sam, it's not your fault." "It doesn't matter anymore, because these trials they're purifying me." "They were here, the books, the boxes." "They're gone." "Who are you?" "Metatron?" "This is Metatron?" "This is Metatron?" "Sit down." " Who sent you?" " We came on our own." "We're the Winchesters." "I'm Dean, this is Sam." "You work for Michael?" "Or Lucifer?" "What, you really haven't heard of us?" "What kind of angel are you?" "We're the frigging Winchesters." "How far can this go?" "Shut up." "Ion." "How far can we let it all drop?" "This charge was left to us." "It's our mission." "Do you even know what the mission was?" "They've been in all our heads." "We aren't machines for them to program and reprogram." "That wasn't what this was meant to be." "Nothing matters." "You are so wrong, brother." "It all matters." "You little prat." "You having fun yet?" "Screw you." "Am I seeing this?" "How'd you figure it out?" "It started when they forgot the secret knock." "But really, it was the way they acted." "I don't think on their best day Sam and Dean would go into town and get me a barbecue dinner not when there are leftover burritos in the fridge." "So my demons were too polite?" "Yeah." "Well, I'll be a son of a whore." "Michael and Lucifer, those dudes are in the deep fryer." "Yeah." "We put them there ourselves." "What about Gabriel and Raphael?" "Dead." "You really don't know this?" " I've been very careful." " Hey, can you...?" "Can you turn that down?" "Turn what down?" "Oh." " You're resonating." " Resonating?" "What do you mean?" "You've undertaken the trials." "You're trying to pull one of the great levers, aren't you?" "You're pretty far along too." "You get that far along, you start resonating with the word." "Or with its source on the material plane." "With me." "You said you were being careful." "Careful how?" "I'm not one of them." "I'm not an archangel." "Really more run-of-the-mill." "I worked in the secretarial pool before God chose me to take down the word." "Anyway, he seemed very worried about his work what would happen to it when he left so he had me write down instructions." "Then he was gone." "After that the archangels took over." "They cried and they wailed." "They wanted their father back." "I mean, we all did." "But then..." "Then they started to scheme." "The archangels decided if they couldn't have Dad they'd take over the universe themselves." "But they couldn't do anything that big without the word of God." "So I began to realize maybe they would realize they needed me." "So you get a ruffle in your feathers and just decide to disappear go stick your head in the sand forever?" "You have no idea what's been going on out there?" "Nope." "That's the whole point." "You soldiers down in the garrison, at least they let you believe the lie." "Upstairs, working for Naomi, working in Intelligence we had no option but to live in the dirt." "She never reset me completely." "I always knew too much." "I had to..." " I had to do my job." " Ion." "Shut up." "So you've been holed up here, or in a wigwam or before that in some cave, listening to stories, reading books?" "And it was something to watch." "What you brought to his Earth all the mayhem, the murder just the raw, wild invention of God's naked apes it was mind-blowing." "But really..." "Really, it was your storytelling." "That is the true flower of free will." "At least, as you've mastered it so far." "When you create stories, you become gods of tiny, intricate dimensions unto themselves." "So many worlds." "I have read as much as it's possible for an angel to read and I haven't caught up." "You know what?" "Pull the frigging trigger." "What?" " Pull the frigging trigger..." " Sam." "...you cowardly piece of garbage." " Hey." "All the time you've been hiding here how much suffering have you read over?" "Humanity's suffering." "And how much of it has been at the hands of your kind?" "Hey, hey." "You want a story?" "Try Kevin Tran's story." "He was just a kid." "He was a good straight-A kid, and then he got sucked in to all of this angel crap and became a prophet of the word of God, your prophet." "You should've been looking out for him, but no instead you're here holed up reading books." "He's dead now, because of you." "You know the Winchesters are up to the third trial?" "That they're gonna shut the door on hell?" "I'm not worried, kid." "You have no idea what's on this demon tablet." "The power you could've gotten with this, if you weren't running around like a chicken with his head cut off." " You think I can't make you tell?" "I know you can't, and you do too." "You know what?" "I've already won." "I have the angel tablet, you little smudge." "And I got deals and plans up the jacksie." "And I don't need you." "Is that it?" "Is he good?" "Give him a minute." "How did you get past Crowley's angel warding?" "I'm the scribe of God." "I erased it." "But you saw, right?" "I mean you're caught up on everything that's been going on?" "On the crap that your brethren's been doing to humanity all this time?" "I saved the boy, didn't I?" "But are you in?" "With us, I mean." "You really intend on closing the doors of hell?" "Seems like the thing to do, don't it?" "It's your choice." "And that's what this has all been about the choices your kind make." "But you're gonna have to weigh that choice." "Ask yourself, what is it going to take to do this?" "And what will the world be like after it's done?" "Dean?" "Dean!" "Kevin?" "Hey." "We thought we lost you, kiddo." "I'm good." "Second half of the tablet." "And I got it." "Third trial." "I didn't tell Crowley." " So, what is it?" " To cure a demon." "Yeah." "Who are you?" "Cure a demon?" "Ignoring the fact that I have no idea what that actually means if we do this, you get better, right?" "I mean, you'll stop trying to cough up a lung and bumping into furniture?" "I feel better, yeah, um, just having a direction to move in." "Good, because where we're headed doesn't sound like a picnic." "But we're heading somewhere." "The end." "Cass?" "A little help here."