spn - outline
2019-12-04 14:04![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mekachu04https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1s1irUwE1Zw5IwPMLYrvAnAmSv2T0gYwtXBF0HKTMgEY/edit#gid=212335941
^ nanowrimo^
------------------1991
She walked over the corpses with a chuckle. Stupid humans.
Maybe if they’d been have been even parsially compitant they would have noticed the incomplete circle the incorrect sigils
Humans.
Serves them right
She looks over their notes with disdane. How they managed to do anything right, the demon had no idea. How they’d ever won /Her/ favour she’d never understood.
She heard humans moving autside the rooms, glancing over to the notes layed out in the room of courspes. This might be wrong, but…..
It wouldn’t take much to alter these. Never to hold a demon, she was smarter than to give humans such knowledge. But it wouldn’t take much to tweek theme to hold soemthing a little .. holier.
And to give them a specific name to summon. It would serve the two of them right, the traitors.
Dagon, lord of the files, hell’s keeper of knowledge, sketched out a new trap, carefully writing out the true name of a much loathed angel intot he page. The traintr and Princi[palit might be off limits to heaven or hell, but /humans/
She left one last note in the margin; be sure to have holy oil and matches ready
--------------------2009-2010 (18-9 years - season ⅘ ??? )
It wasn’t one of dad’s safehouses; wasn’t even one of dad’s trusted informates. But there werent many of dad’s trusted informates left that they haven’t already run dry on info.
Dad winchester had them listed as provayours of powerful occult items; powerful occult itmes they’d refused to tell where they’d comefrom. Natural, john winchester had been highley susspios of them, and hadn’t mad many efforst to stay in touch.
Dean sat drumming his fingers agaist the sterring wheel of his baby, looking at the shack. Weeds grew heavy between him and the front oor. Sam checked the notes in the infamous winchester journal, “the last time dad seems to actually have talked about them was ‘97. I can’t find any mention of them again after that”
“So, ten something years. Pretty sure we hit a dead end sammy.”
Sam closed the book anyway, tossing it up on the dash, before noth brothers obsered the house again. “Maybe they left soemthing bedins? Best case, maybe something about whaatecer items they where dealing in?”
With a sign, dean opened his door, and the two brothers stepped out into the weeds, walking up to the delapitatd house.
They’d barely stepped on the porch when dedn’s cell whent off, “Its cas?” he muttered, waving at sam to work on jimming the lock open.
“Cas-”
“Where did you go!”
“I told you, were checing out-”
“Ypu’re gone dean! I can’t sence you at all.”
Sammy paused, looing up from the door as he finsihed pickign te lock. It was booby trapped, no doubt - it was a hunter house after all - and they both needed to be paying attention before procedding. For thir own sake.
Dean groaned, stepping back off the porch towear the impala to argue with castiel, feeling odd having this coversation in earshot of sam.
Some ward must be hidden in the overgrouth, as doon as dean stepped across it, “there yOu are!” came out of the phone speaers, before Castielwas standing /right/ in deans face.
“Where is sam?”
Sam waved from his posiion still on the porch as dean grstured over his was.
Can followed the movement, but looked blankly over at the house, unseeing, as dean hung up, grombling at the close quaters.
“In the field?”
“No. on the… cas?”
Castiel looked at dena in confusion, and then back at where sam was standing up. No. not at sam. Still blankly.
“Cas?” sam called, walking over to join them. Cas jerked his head towrd the soucd, but still saw nothing.
“Sam? Where? I can hear you, but “
“Cas? I’m right… i’m like ten feet in front of you?”
Castiel held his arm out, blindly, grobing at the air. Dean stood awkwardly at his side, looking worriedly between his angel and his brother. Carefuly, castiel stepped forward. Once.
Twice.
Three steps.
You could see when he hit the wards, a whole body flinch, “Cas?”
The angel graped deans arm, grip harsh, his eyes wide and strigning.
“Cas? What’s wrong?”
He cocked his head, not hsi usualy gesture of struggling to understand, but more like he was struggling to hear a low far off sound, “I cant…. I cant see anything.. I can’t hear….”
“Cas?”
“Not cleary. Its… /I/ can’t hear you, but.. My vessel can. Jimmy can.”
He coked his head, squinting. It was strange, closing his own sight to force his gaze though the limited eyes of his human vessal. Soon, the house and sam came into murky view
“This house it warded against Heaven’s gaze,” he muttered, Sam reacing out to take his enbow to help him up th e porch steps.
Inside, the house was just as torn and aged as the outside yard, wallpaper peeling and every surface covered in thic dust. The three of them carefully split up, looking over the room for clues.
“Man….” dean whispered, pulling a paper from the trash, “sam!”
He held up a newpaper, headline warning of the upcoming Y2K danger. Sam shoo his head in desbelief, while cas squinted at it. Pittying him, dean droppe dit down, “paper’s from 1999.” he explained.
The continued exploration went on in otherwise quite, until sam called out. They found him standing before a shelf of empty glass jars, each lid locked cloed.
Maybe not empty. Cas was staring at hem in horror. His hands shook as he took one from sam, looking at it cocked eyed
“What is it?”
He shakes his head beofre taign hte jar outside, dena and sam trialing behind him. He doesn’t pause until he’s nearly to the car; as soon as his sight in unvieled he droped the jar with a curse, dean straighteding in surpride. The words were echonian, but the intent was clear.
:Cas?” sam asks, picking the jar up form where it lays in the dry dirt. It seems empty, but the shawod left under it shows there is clealy soemthing in the glass.
“Cas?” dean asked this time, looking at he jar in sam’s hands.
“Feathers from the Host.”
“Feathers? Like…” dean gestres at castiel’s back. The angel, solemn faced, knodded. Sam dropped the jar lie it was hot, feeling worng holding such a thing. The three of them looked back at the house wariyl.
Cas looked at the jar ont he ground, shining innocently in the sun. it didn’t take much power to summon an end to the jar, the glass shattering with a loo and the contnes inside bursthing into flame
It didn’t take much looking to find the door tothe celler; a large steel door, unfamilour scropt paining the panels. “More wards,” cas said, tracing te patterns and squinting.
“I don’t think i can go inside. Not if i want to leave again,” he warned, looking back aat the brothers uneaisly.
Dean knodded, “finish getting ride of the..f eahrers. Sam ans me’ll see wahts going on downstairs.”
***
Theres a body in the basemnt.
Its strung up in chains, starveld to skin and bones, left to rot in the dark.
Its kneeling, arms strached out to its sides to keep the body upright. The added horror is the tubing leading from the emancipeded arm to a long overflowed bottle on the counter, dried blood having run over and flooded the workbench.
“They left the poor bastered bleeding…”
Sam looked away as Dean looked over the contraption, insteadaing looking voer the body strung up. Soemthing remenising of a devils trap painted to ground underthen, but it was unlike anyhting sam’s seem prefor.
Dean glanced over the body once more. Thin and naked, not a scrap of dignity affored the condemmed. The winchesters might have been cold bloded to monsters, but even this was too far. Whatever the creature was, he was a endowed as a ken doll,a nd Dean found the common barb he’s thrown at cas twisting ungly in his gut.
“Think he as realy.. Ya know.” Dean murmered, not wanted to sound rediculaous, but also not wanting to picture his own angel having been left behind like this man. More then 10 years since anyone had been in this room, yet they hadn’t even learned about angels until Castiel.
“How’d they do this? How they learn this, and keep it quiet? No one else has anyhting close, and yet…..”
“They had an angel. And they cut it up,a nd sold pieces off to Dad, and Bobby, and how many others. And no one figures it out.”
“Damn…” Dean muttered.
Sam shuffeed from where he was kneeling to inspect to trap, to gently touch where the thick needle had been shoved into a vien in the creatures arm. He carefully pulled the mettle out, tossing the contraption aside, before working to unlock the chains around the bound beings arms. “Its not. Stiff. Not.. cold?”
/not dead/
Dean stepped up behind, hand running around a set of chains behind the … angel … “Damn.” he sowre again.
Sam looked up sharply, watching dean trace the chains to where they held /something/ aloft behind him. “...the .. is… Wings?”
Dean llok ill, knodding.
Sam glacees at the creature’s face. The eyes have slitted open. They don’t loo at him, jsut stare out blankely.
It took time, but sam ans dean undid the shackels to the body. Sam carefully possisions the pale form on the floor; curled on its side, dean easing invisable wings as best as he can guess into folding thm agains its back.
Sam freezes then, absent-mindeingly waving for deans attention. The brothers both look down at drawn face, at coldgrey slits they look out without seeing.
“Okay, lets get ‘im to Cas”
Sam holds the creatures torso close, funbling with heavy wings he can’t see, while dean holds stick thin elgs to keep them from catching on the steps.
Cas as cleared out the Hunter’s stash, and waits anxiously at the door. The wards lets sam and dean pass with their burden with little reisiance, and cas is their to help with doors until they get the body settled into the back seat of the impala.
“There are wards on his body,” cas warns, looking at down though jimmy’s eyes. “He is still hidden from my sight. Hidden from my touch. I hold him now, but feel nothing.”
---
Crowley shook his head, stepping away from the body. “These are before my time,b oys. Older then me by millenia. You’ll need to talk to the old guard for those.”
The demon looked uneasy, tossing something over in his head. over and over and over.
“What is is, crowley?”
The demon flicnched, face scrunched. “So, here’s the thing. I /may/ know someone who’d be… very… interested in your find. He /may/ kill you all for it though. “
“Who?”
The demon muttered, fightiyng with himself, before finally, “the Demon /Crow/ley. I may have… borrowed his old name when he upgraded. Opend a lot of doors in those early days,”
“You stole another demon’s /name/?”
“/Borrowed/. And he didn’t seem to mind, got credit for my early good deeds, so he could go off and do what ever it is field agents get up to in their free time up here.”
---
It taes time to draw up the new devils trap. Crowley warned that the starndard traps might not hold somehting as old as Crowley Prime. ‘Maybe not luci levels,’ crowley warned, ‘but maybe plan for it jsut in case.’
In the mean time, they also copied down the brands and tattos marked into the unresponsive body. Work out the meaning of the marks,a nd the placement.
There’s a grouping of five arcoss the top of its torso. One on its sternum, two on its shoulders, two on its shoulder baldes.
“Its why i can’t sence them,” castiel comes to understand, “ not unlie the markings i’ve given you both.” the angels voice turns quiet, reflecive. “They work against them as much as against me.”
Sam regards the body. It’s vaugiuly male shaped, but shorter and stockier then any of them. They caualoged the brands on his legs already, and have dressed him in a pai of sam’s sleep pants; waist wide enough, but legs entirely too long. Sam’s got an old button up waiting for when they’ve finished copying the marks on his chest.
At this point, its more for sam and dean’s comefort than anyne else.
“So, what. He can’t see becase of the brands? Can’t he just look though his vessels eye? Liek you are?”
Castiel cocks his head, “I would assume so.” he stats, before carefully raching out to force the eyelids apart. its eyes are blue. Where as cas’ eyes are a vibrant blue, these are pale and grey. Maybe like a storm if there was any life in them. Instead, they are flat and dull. They don’t track att, just stare blindly out like befroe.
The sigils on its bck block smell and taste. The right shoulder blocks hearing. The left, sight. The one on its chest block touch.
‘I get hearing and sight, sure. But why block all five sences?”
“Its a combined spell. They way they’ve drawn it, it only works if all five are blocked.’
‘Seems … needlessly cruel.” sma’s mind is haunted by the newspaper. 1999. He;s been down inthe room sicne /at least/ 1999. How long before then? How long has those hunters had this ...a ngel…. Trapped and alone in that basement. Alone and deprived of even /feeling/
Sensory depravation. Solitary confiment. Sam shuddered.
“What’s the safetst way to break them?”
---
The /easiest/ way would be to break each sigil one at a time. To burn them off.
It might kill the creature. If it didn’t, it could possibly unlock its powers. They were still trying to figure out other brands.
1999 was a lone time to be alone.
It might not be sane anymore. Might not have sbeen samte to start with. God only knows ho they caught it in the first place.
Letting it loose could easily get them all killed.
Might be kinder to kill it. Sam knew dean and cas both held that option inthei back pockets
Kill it outright.
Break the sigils the easy way, and hope it
A didn’t kill the angel
B worked at all
C that the angel didn’t kill them once freed
Summon the “old Guard’ Crowley to ask him how to break the bindings
Lets Cas keep looking for one of heavens’ ‘old guard’ to be sympathetic and come and take a look
The three of them looked over the devils trap again; its strong enough to hold a knight or prince of hell, and lined with holy oil jsut in case.
--
the Demon /Crow/ley is quite the stickler on pronunciation, but otherwise unhelpful from where they have him trapped. Cas recoiled when he’s first summoned, quick to light the oil, much to dean and sam’s surprise.
“He’s…. Not … just a demon.” Castiel says finally, drwing the hunters to what he hopes it out of ear shot.
“Crowley said he was ‘odl guard’ - “
“He’s a fallen angel.”
He says it so abrustly, he suprises himelf.
“Did.. did crowley know that? Did he know he was suggestiong we summon another fallen angel to earth? Did we just accidently let a fallen angel loose on earth?!”
“I doubt he knew - beside, he said /Crow/ley was a firls agent. Impliede he was already loose on earth.”
“Why haven’t we come across him yet, what’s he been doing during all this then?”
--
“As much fun as the light show is,” the demon drawled, sounded irritatingly british, “Is there a reason you’ve drug me here, or can i be on my way yet? I’ve actually got plans to get too. Maybe we can reschedual?”
Dean barely heald back a snarel, “You’ve got plans?”
“I’m a man of my word, and i did promise my godson id meet him for dinner tongiht. Hellion worries abotu me ya see. Thinks i might be lonely.” he drops ‘hellion’ down like a fond swear before pouting, “I’ve still got to change, you’;ll make me late.”
“Your /godson/ really.”
“Been there more for him than his own folks the last decade or so. Really didn’t plan of bothering him after he moves across the pond, but then he called on me after a bad bender, and i couldn’t jsut ignore the ccall.”
“Where are you meating this godson?”
“Long standing reservations at the Rtiz”
He got blank looks at them at first, until dean snorted, “yeah right. You gonna meet him a nine precisely?”
“I pay the bill,” /Crow/ley crooned back, before his face turned storm and closed off
Dean shook his head. At Castiel’s questioning look, he waved the angel off, “It’s a Queen song. He’s fucking with us.”
“Freddie always had good tastes in the high life. Do wish i could take created for that line, but i could never prove it.”
“You knew freddie Murcury?”
“Of course. Granted my /car/s the one who went and fell in love with him, but i suppose it could be worse. He was nice to my .. friend .. too. One of the few that seemed to be okay with us both, even if he didn;t know what we where.”
“Demons.” the brothers decided to wait to unpack the rest of that never.
Crowley only shrugged in return.
“I really do need to be wrapping this up,” he interjected again, “Warloc’s expecting me, and if i don’t at least let him know i’m running late, he may… take it the wrong way. And you do /not/ want that boy making paniced phone calls. He;s got a lot more pull then he realises, and i don’t want to casue any interrealm insident. Go…. Sa…. Somebody help us if he calls Adam first. I’m retired boys. I’m nt getting bac in with all this.”
It hurts to hear their brothers name tossed so causually, even if they know it can’t be the same person.
---
HE looks over the sigils, frown deepenign on his forhead. “Where did you see these?!? I haven’t… I haven’t seen anthing like this…. Well, i’m not sure i’ve ever seen it written like this. He’d know for sure, but this shouldn’t be here. We haven’t used these since before. Well, before earth. I din’t know htye could be written down.”
Team Free Will only seemed to catch half of the demon’s mutterings; he referanced a lot of things they didn’t follow, and made no attempts to excplain.
“I am …. /not/ the expert on this, not remotely, but there’s missing pieces to this. Are you sure you copied it all?”
He just distrusting looks back, but didn’t seem offented, “Look, i get not giving me the whole thing, I wouldn’t show it to me either. But theirs defiantly part missing its lie youre showing me jsut the nouns to a sentance, and miming out he verbs as you think i’ve gotten to them while reading. Never mind everythign else you need for a sentace.
“I can’t translate this for you if i’ve only got the nouns. What is this eve for?”
--
They finally give crowley the comeplete copies.
The demon shakes his head, sitting cross legged as he looks the sheets over, :Still not all heere boys. But. i;ll explain what youve given me for a phone call. Certainly i deseve a phone call, yea?”
“Sorry, frsh out of blood.”
Even behind the sades, dean can see his bewillerement. “Waht…. OH!! Oh, no no no Like. A phone call. with a mobile. Warlock, remember? I’m /very/ late at this point.”
“I;m not just letting you phone a freind.”
“So call te Ritz yourself. As for Warlock.”
“By name?”
“Yes.” he says it in confusion, like he’s not sure why it was a question in the first place.
It takkes a minute to google the Ritz London. They don;t have a plan for international calls, but Crowley asks why they would need one, just call.
The weirdest part is that it works.
Sam asks them if they have a guest named Warlock, who might be waiting for someone.
The do.
A man answers, “This is Warlock.”
He sounds their age, and he sounds worried.
“Hello?”
Croely calls out from across the room, heard perfectly over the phone beucse he doesn’t expect diffrently, “Warlock dear, its Nanny.”
“Nanny, where /are/ you? Are you okay?”
“Perfectly fine love,” the demons voice is pitched softer, but otherwise unaltered, “Just got a bit tied up with things. You know how work gets.”
The man chuckled, “You’re supposted to be retried”
“No rest for the wicked”
“Ypu;re not going to make it tonight, are you?”
Crowly looks at his capturs. They stare back, “‘Fraid not love. But don’t worry, we’ll meet up next week.”
Dean’s ready to hang up, but Warlocks voice calles out, one last question. “Nanny, should I call Adam?”
Crowleys look to the hunters is dark and steeled, “No need to bother him just yet, dear.”
“Can you take me off speaker? Who ever has the phone?”
Crowley looks curios, and Dean does, holding up the speaker to his ear. He still doens’t say anything.
“Nanny seems to think you aren’t worth smiting outright.” the voice says, cold. “So i’m not calling in favours yet, becuase /I/ think he needs the distraction. But you’re gonna let Him call me tomorrow, or i will level whatever little holw you;ve crawled into. And when I’m done calling in the airstrick, i’m gonna have the bloody anticrhsit himself come by personally to bring him home. Whatever fucked up game you think you’re playing, you’ve already lost by stealing him. You can’t hurt him in anyway way that matters, but i can still very much hurt you. So tread /very/ carefully, /hunter/”
---
The demon shook his head. “I dout you’re being dusibulous at this point, so maybe the lines are hidden. Soemthing etched under the surface. Maybe like...braille? Ya now.”
he’s tristing the pages in curiousyl, spead out like a puzzle. The flames have been put out, but the oil is stil there at the outside of the trap, ready to light again.
“Okay - so, if we… isolate touch, we sould be able to feel the rest of the bidning - i asuume this is a binding? Yeah, it looks liek one. We don’t wanna turn it off jsut yet - might have a backlash being storied. - nothing here /stops/ power, but is a da,mn. So if its binding - say hellfire, then if you just turn off touch, then youre gonna have hella hot, invisade, sentless hell fire that’s gonna burn everything it touches. So we… muffle it a bit.
“It’s be warm, but as long as your not an angel it wont catch anythign on fire. Is it hellfire? I wonder if you ciuld do it to holy water. Make it safer to move around, if you could bind just touch. No accidental melting. Would come in handy - that.
“Until its time to use it. That could be an issue - if it takes too much to unbind….”
Castiel stood watch outside the cricle, listening to the demon ramble. He seemed comeyly at ease in his trap, taking aimlessly and at great length. We would talk at his captors, but ddin’t seem offened or hurt when no one tlaked back to him.
He was at ease, but Castiel could feel a long set dispare set within him. He didn’t like that he recognised this emotion from the deep seated distress that had long sense taken hold of the winchesters, didn’t like that the part of him that was quick to sooth it from the humans has asking if he was going todo the same for the demon.
The phone call had been most cursio, and while Castiel sensce to decet of double meanings from the demon, the man on the otherseide has left them all on the wrong foot. Who /was/ this ‘warlock’ and who the hell was he meaning bu the antichrist?
“Look, Look, angel,” the demon waved at him, and he recoiled out of arms reach. The demon actually looked hurt by that, “i see. Sorry.”
He handed a paper to Castiel instead. “This should clamp down ont he touch part. See if you can find any
--
“So ypure mystery spells in here, yeah?”
All three spun un heel to where their unwanted quest set resting against the door frame. Shades still obscured his face, but he grined like the cat who got he crem
“How did you get out?!”
“Should have lite thef ire gain. I don’t acytakly know if it would have kept me, but lines of the floor only work if the demon in them believes they’d work. But don’t worry, most of them do.”
“That’s not how it works,” Sam started, the demon coscking his head in a manner too similaors to Castiels.
“Tall human, that how /everything/ works. Escpeailly with us. Belief is 9/10ths of the law. You humans might have a few more laws, but those only work becuase you expect hem too. And even when you believe in them comepletely, you still spend all your energy finding new ways to brea them”
Dean was shaling his head in disbelif, and Sam just looked at him dumbly.
“Look, it’s not your fault, i mean, the apple did a lot to get you all thinking around the rules, but most jsut aren’t made to think outside the box.” He looked directly at Castiel, “No offense. So, what mystery item are we working on?”
He’s pearing around them; the rescude andel on full display. But curiosuly, the demon doesn’t even seem to notice.
---
The spell provided works. But castiel isn’t sure how to writie the feeling down, and they agree to allow the demon in the room.
Only becuase the sigisl that keep the angel from castiels celestial visin seems to hide him from the demon completly.
What’s curisos is that it /didn;t/ keep it hidden from their crwly.
They waited until after crowleys check in with the mystery warlock. The man called them this time (time to burn this phone)
Corwley still remained blind to the angel, instead reading the air for the spell work not visible to human eyes. Old Guard Magic.
Crowley wriggled his fingers, and Sam begrudgingly took his handm leading his questing fingers to the line or binding across angelis skin. When the demons hand touched flesh though, all jokes and jovial mood dropped way, and the demon jerked awy, face tweisted in rage, “WHat is tthis? You’ve bound a /person?/ are they evens tilla ive? That’s… thatosn inhuman!”
The outrage was surprising, so much so, that they didn’t react intime as the demon hsoved them away, surging forward to trace the sigil of touch. The demon was carefully feeling out the lines of the spell, working blindly, but deftly, pulling at weavings only he and castiel had been able to feel.
“We found him this way,” Dean said findly, looking warily, as the demon knelt before their strand ward, Castiel watching over his work.
The angel on the ground shivered, the first movement of its own as the demon drew away from his chest. The humans watched the sigil burned into its chest glow yellow around the edges. The mark remained, otherwise unchanged. For the first time, the chest rose and fell, like the angel handled taken a breth the entire time it was bound. It shuddered under the demons hands, but otherwise it remained unmoving.
“Easy, child,” the demons soothed, the body still hidden form him, but carefull feeling out the curve of the body, finisng the shoulder, “shhhh. It’s alot at once, i know. I know..”
((owrks delibratly slow, as to not have the wave of touch become overwhealming))
---
The dmon had gotten back ito the room. Castiel wanted to be annoyed, but the demon just held the hands blindly in hiswon, whicpering words the other angel still couldnot hear, pressing patterend into the hands. “What are you doing?”
“Talking”
“He can’t ehar you.”
“Not all humans can hear,” the demon said carefully. “Jsut like some don’t talk. At least not with voices. But humans are so very clever. They use hands to say words.”
Castil watched him continue paterns into the hands, “What are yu telling him?”
“That he’s safe. That we;ll get this ward off him.”
“ANd he knows these words. With your hands?”
“Dunno. But i think the intent comes across. If he’s smart, then he ‘ll relaise its a pattern. He’ll know somoens talkign to him.”
---
The emon froze hands pausein where he’d cupped the side of the man’s face. His fingers tips just brushed the soft wite curls above the angels ears, but the demons face was frozen in mute horror.
His other hand pulled away from th spell, cupping the otherseideof the face. He turned to Castiel, then to Dean and then to Sam.’It.s…. Please? Is it….”
He shook his head madely, tears starting to run down sheecks from under the sunglasses.
“I dont…” sam wasnt; sure what o say, and dean hated the look of loose and terrified hope on the face of a heireditary enime.
“He;s not.. Its not a human, is it.:
No one moved for a long lok, not wanted to confirm or dienie. What waould a dmeon do, with a helpless angel?
The dmeon didn;t seem to need an answer, fingers touching soft cirls, “Angel?”
They couldn’t see eacher other, couldnt hear each other. Couldn;t even smell each other. But they could feel each other now, and even lcoked awy in his own mind, the soft touches had drawn him out, and the hands holding him now, one of the last good things he could remember feeling, so veyr vyer long ago.
“Crowley?”
---
Wood/green (sight) Fire/red (taste) Earth/yellow(touch) Metal/white(smell) Water/black(hearing)
^ nanowrimo^
------------------1991
She walked over the corpses with a chuckle. Stupid humans.
Maybe if they’d been have been even parsially compitant they would have noticed the incomplete circle the incorrect sigils
Humans.
Serves them right
She looks over their notes with disdane. How they managed to do anything right, the demon had no idea. How they’d ever won /Her/ favour she’d never understood.
She heard humans moving autside the rooms, glancing over to the notes layed out in the room of courspes. This might be wrong, but…..
It wouldn’t take much to alter these. Never to hold a demon, she was smarter than to give humans such knowledge. But it wouldn’t take much to tweek theme to hold soemthing a little .. holier.
And to give them a specific name to summon. It would serve the two of them right, the traitors.
Dagon, lord of the files, hell’s keeper of knowledge, sketched out a new trap, carefully writing out the true name of a much loathed angel intot he page. The traintr and Princi[palit might be off limits to heaven or hell, but /humans/
She left one last note in the margin; be sure to have holy oil and matches ready
--------------------2009-2010 (18-9 years - season ⅘ ??? )
It wasn’t one of dad’s safehouses; wasn’t even one of dad’s trusted informates. But there werent many of dad’s trusted informates left that they haven’t already run dry on info.
Dad winchester had them listed as provayours of powerful occult items; powerful occult itmes they’d refused to tell where they’d comefrom. Natural, john winchester had been highley susspios of them, and hadn’t mad many efforst to stay in touch.
Dean sat drumming his fingers agaist the sterring wheel of his baby, looking at the shack. Weeds grew heavy between him and the front oor. Sam checked the notes in the infamous winchester journal, “the last time dad seems to actually have talked about them was ‘97. I can’t find any mention of them again after that”
“So, ten something years. Pretty sure we hit a dead end sammy.”
Sam closed the book anyway, tossing it up on the dash, before noth brothers obsered the house again. “Maybe they left soemthing bedins? Best case, maybe something about whaatecer items they where dealing in?”
With a sign, dean opened his door, and the two brothers stepped out into the weeds, walking up to the delapitatd house.
They’d barely stepped on the porch when dedn’s cell whent off, “Its cas?” he muttered, waving at sam to work on jimming the lock open.
“Cas-”
“Where did you go!”
“I told you, were checing out-”
“Ypu’re gone dean! I can’t sence you at all.”
Sammy paused, looing up from the door as he finsihed pickign te lock. It was booby trapped, no doubt - it was a hunter house after all - and they both needed to be paying attention before procedding. For thir own sake.
Dean groaned, stepping back off the porch towear the impala to argue with castiel, feeling odd having this coversation in earshot of sam.
Some ward must be hidden in the overgrouth, as doon as dean stepped across it, “there yOu are!” came out of the phone speaers, before Castielwas standing /right/ in deans face.
“Where is sam?”
Sam waved from his posiion still on the porch as dean grstured over his was.
Can followed the movement, but looked blankly over at the house, unseeing, as dean hung up, grombling at the close quaters.
“In the field?”
“No. on the… cas?”
Castiel looked at dena in confusion, and then back at where sam was standing up. No. not at sam. Still blankly.
“Cas?” sam called, walking over to join them. Cas jerked his head towrd the soucd, but still saw nothing.
“Sam? Where? I can hear you, but “
“Cas? I’m right… i’m like ten feet in front of you?”
Castiel held his arm out, blindly, grobing at the air. Dean stood awkwardly at his side, looking worriedly between his angel and his brother. Carefuly, castiel stepped forward. Once.
Twice.
Three steps.
You could see when he hit the wards, a whole body flinch, “Cas?”
The angel graped deans arm, grip harsh, his eyes wide and strigning.
“Cas? What’s wrong?”
He cocked his head, not hsi usualy gesture of struggling to understand, but more like he was struggling to hear a low far off sound, “I cant…. I cant see anything.. I can’t hear….”
“Cas?”
“Not cleary. Its… /I/ can’t hear you, but.. My vessel can. Jimmy can.”
He coked his head, squinting. It was strange, closing his own sight to force his gaze though the limited eyes of his human vessal. Soon, the house and sam came into murky view
“This house it warded against Heaven’s gaze,” he muttered, Sam reacing out to take his enbow to help him up th e porch steps.
Inside, the house was just as torn and aged as the outside yard, wallpaper peeling and every surface covered in thic dust. The three of them carefully split up, looking over the room for clues.
“Man….” dean whispered, pulling a paper from the trash, “sam!”
He held up a newpaper, headline warning of the upcoming Y2K danger. Sam shoo his head in desbelief, while cas squinted at it. Pittying him, dean droppe dit down, “paper’s from 1999.” he explained.
The continued exploration went on in otherwise quite, until sam called out. They found him standing before a shelf of empty glass jars, each lid locked cloed.
Maybe not empty. Cas was staring at hem in horror. His hands shook as he took one from sam, looking at it cocked eyed
“What is it?”
He shakes his head beofre taign hte jar outside, dena and sam trialing behind him. He doesn’t pause until he’s nearly to the car; as soon as his sight in unvieled he droped the jar with a curse, dean straighteding in surpride. The words were echonian, but the intent was clear.
:Cas?” sam asks, picking the jar up form where it lays in the dry dirt. It seems empty, but the shawod left under it shows there is clealy soemthing in the glass.
“Cas?” dean asked this time, looking at he jar in sam’s hands.
“Feathers from the Host.”
“Feathers? Like…” dean gestres at castiel’s back. The angel, solemn faced, knodded. Sam dropped the jar lie it was hot, feeling worng holding such a thing. The three of them looked back at the house wariyl.
Cas looked at the jar ont he ground, shining innocently in the sun. it didn’t take much power to summon an end to the jar, the glass shattering with a loo and the contnes inside bursthing into flame
It didn’t take much looking to find the door tothe celler; a large steel door, unfamilour scropt paining the panels. “More wards,” cas said, tracing te patterns and squinting.
“I don’t think i can go inside. Not if i want to leave again,” he warned, looking back aat the brothers uneaisly.
Dean knodded, “finish getting ride of the..f eahrers. Sam ans me’ll see wahts going on downstairs.”
***
Theres a body in the basemnt.
Its strung up in chains, starveld to skin and bones, left to rot in the dark.
Its kneeling, arms strached out to its sides to keep the body upright. The added horror is the tubing leading from the emancipeded arm to a long overflowed bottle on the counter, dried blood having run over and flooded the workbench.
“They left the poor bastered bleeding…”
Sam looked away as Dean looked over the contraption, insteadaing looking voer the body strung up. Soemthing remenising of a devils trap painted to ground underthen, but it was unlike anyhting sam’s seem prefor.
Dean glanced over the body once more. Thin and naked, not a scrap of dignity affored the condemmed. The winchesters might have been cold bloded to monsters, but even this was too far. Whatever the creature was, he was a endowed as a ken doll,a nd Dean found the common barb he’s thrown at cas twisting ungly in his gut.
“Think he as realy.. Ya know.” Dean murmered, not wanted to sound rediculaous, but also not wanting to picture his own angel having been left behind like this man. More then 10 years since anyone had been in this room, yet they hadn’t even learned about angels until Castiel.
“How’d they do this? How they learn this, and keep it quiet? No one else has anyhting close, and yet…..”
“They had an angel. And they cut it up,a nd sold pieces off to Dad, and Bobby, and how many others. And no one figures it out.”
“Damn…” Dean muttered.
Sam shuffeed from where he was kneeling to inspect to trap, to gently touch where the thick needle had been shoved into a vien in the creatures arm. He carefully pulled the mettle out, tossing the contraption aside, before working to unlock the chains around the bound beings arms. “Its not. Stiff. Not.. cold?”
/not dead/
Dean stepped up behind, hand running around a set of chains behind the … angel … “Damn.” he sowre again.
Sam looked up sharply, watching dean trace the chains to where they held /something/ aloft behind him. “...the .. is… Wings?”
Dean llok ill, knodding.
Sam glacees at the creature’s face. The eyes have slitted open. They don’t loo at him, jsut stare out blankely.
It took time, but sam ans dean undid the shackels to the body. Sam carefully possisions the pale form on the floor; curled on its side, dean easing invisable wings as best as he can guess into folding thm agains its back.
Sam freezes then, absent-mindeingly waving for deans attention. The brothers both look down at drawn face, at coldgrey slits they look out without seeing.
“Okay, lets get ‘im to Cas”
Sam holds the creatures torso close, funbling with heavy wings he can’t see, while dean holds stick thin elgs to keep them from catching on the steps.
Cas as cleared out the Hunter’s stash, and waits anxiously at the door. The wards lets sam and dean pass with their burden with little reisiance, and cas is their to help with doors until they get the body settled into the back seat of the impala.
“There are wards on his body,” cas warns, looking at down though jimmy’s eyes. “He is still hidden from my sight. Hidden from my touch. I hold him now, but feel nothing.”
---
Crowley shook his head, stepping away from the body. “These are before my time,b oys. Older then me by millenia. You’ll need to talk to the old guard for those.”
The demon looked uneasy, tossing something over in his head. over and over and over.
“What is is, crowley?”
The demon flicnched, face scrunched. “So, here’s the thing. I /may/ know someone who’d be… very… interested in your find. He /may/ kill you all for it though. “
“Who?”
The demon muttered, fightiyng with himself, before finally, “the Demon /Crow/ley. I may have… borrowed his old name when he upgraded. Opend a lot of doors in those early days,”
“You stole another demon’s /name/?”
“/Borrowed/. And he didn’t seem to mind, got credit for my early good deeds, so he could go off and do what ever it is field agents get up to in their free time up here.”
---
It taes time to draw up the new devils trap. Crowley warned that the starndard traps might not hold somehting as old as Crowley Prime. ‘Maybe not luci levels,’ crowley warned, ‘but maybe plan for it jsut in case.’
In the mean time, they also copied down the brands and tattos marked into the unresponsive body. Work out the meaning of the marks,a nd the placement.
There’s a grouping of five arcoss the top of its torso. One on its sternum, two on its shoulders, two on its shoulder baldes.
“Its why i can’t sence them,” castiel comes to understand, “ not unlie the markings i’ve given you both.” the angels voice turns quiet, reflecive. “They work against them as much as against me.”
Sam regards the body. It’s vaugiuly male shaped, but shorter and stockier then any of them. They caualoged the brands on his legs already, and have dressed him in a pai of sam’s sleep pants; waist wide enough, but legs entirely too long. Sam’s got an old button up waiting for when they’ve finished copying the marks on his chest.
At this point, its more for sam and dean’s comefort than anyne else.
“So, what. He can’t see becase of the brands? Can’t he just look though his vessels eye? Liek you are?”
Castiel cocks his head, “I would assume so.” he stats, before carefully raching out to force the eyelids apart. its eyes are blue. Where as cas’ eyes are a vibrant blue, these are pale and grey. Maybe like a storm if there was any life in them. Instead, they are flat and dull. They don’t track att, just stare blindly out like befroe.
The sigils on its bck block smell and taste. The right shoulder blocks hearing. The left, sight. The one on its chest block touch.
‘I get hearing and sight, sure. But why block all five sences?”
“Its a combined spell. They way they’ve drawn it, it only works if all five are blocked.’
‘Seems … needlessly cruel.” sma’s mind is haunted by the newspaper. 1999. He;s been down inthe room sicne /at least/ 1999. How long before then? How long has those hunters had this ...a ngel…. Trapped and alone in that basement. Alone and deprived of even /feeling/
Sensory depravation. Solitary confiment. Sam shuddered.
“What’s the safetst way to break them?”
---
The /easiest/ way would be to break each sigil one at a time. To burn them off.
It might kill the creature. If it didn’t, it could possibly unlock its powers. They were still trying to figure out other brands.
1999 was a lone time to be alone.
It might not be sane anymore. Might not have sbeen samte to start with. God only knows ho they caught it in the first place.
Letting it loose could easily get them all killed.
Might be kinder to kill it. Sam knew dean and cas both held that option inthei back pockets
Kill it outright.
Break the sigils the easy way, and hope it
A didn’t kill the angel
B worked at all
C that the angel didn’t kill them once freed
Summon the “old Guard’ Crowley to ask him how to break the bindings
Lets Cas keep looking for one of heavens’ ‘old guard’ to be sympathetic and come and take a look
The three of them looked over the devils trap again; its strong enough to hold a knight or prince of hell, and lined with holy oil jsut in case.
--
the Demon /Crow/ley is quite the stickler on pronunciation, but otherwise unhelpful from where they have him trapped. Cas recoiled when he’s first summoned, quick to light the oil, much to dean and sam’s surprise.
“He’s…. Not … just a demon.” Castiel says finally, drwing the hunters to what he hopes it out of ear shot.
“Crowley said he was ‘odl guard’ - “
“He’s a fallen angel.”
He says it so abrustly, he suprises himelf.
“Did.. did crowley know that? Did he know he was suggestiong we summon another fallen angel to earth? Did we just accidently let a fallen angel loose on earth?!”
“I doubt he knew - beside, he said /Crow/ley was a firls agent. Impliede he was already loose on earth.”
“Why haven’t we come across him yet, what’s he been doing during all this then?”
--
“As much fun as the light show is,” the demon drawled, sounded irritatingly british, “Is there a reason you’ve drug me here, or can i be on my way yet? I’ve actually got plans to get too. Maybe we can reschedual?”
Dean barely heald back a snarel, “You’ve got plans?”
“I’m a man of my word, and i did promise my godson id meet him for dinner tongiht. Hellion worries abotu me ya see. Thinks i might be lonely.” he drops ‘hellion’ down like a fond swear before pouting, “I’ve still got to change, you’;ll make me late.”
“Your /godson/ really.”
“Been there more for him than his own folks the last decade or so. Really didn’t plan of bothering him after he moves across the pond, but then he called on me after a bad bender, and i couldn’t jsut ignore the ccall.”
“Where are you meating this godson?”
“Long standing reservations at the Rtiz”
He got blank looks at them at first, until dean snorted, “yeah right. You gonna meet him a nine precisely?”
“I pay the bill,” /Crow/ley crooned back, before his face turned storm and closed off
Dean shook his head. At Castiel’s questioning look, he waved the angel off, “It’s a Queen song. He’s fucking with us.”
“Freddie always had good tastes in the high life. Do wish i could take created for that line, but i could never prove it.”
“You knew freddie Murcury?”
“Of course. Granted my /car/s the one who went and fell in love with him, but i suppose it could be worse. He was nice to my .. friend .. too. One of the few that seemed to be okay with us both, even if he didn;t know what we where.”
“Demons.” the brothers decided to wait to unpack the rest of that never.
Crowley only shrugged in return.
“I really do need to be wrapping this up,” he interjected again, “Warloc’s expecting me, and if i don’t at least let him know i’m running late, he may… take it the wrong way. And you do /not/ want that boy making paniced phone calls. He;s got a lot more pull then he realises, and i don’t want to casue any interrealm insident. Go…. Sa…. Somebody help us if he calls Adam first. I’m retired boys. I’m nt getting bac in with all this.”
It hurts to hear their brothers name tossed so causually, even if they know it can’t be the same person.
---
HE looks over the sigils, frown deepenign on his forhead. “Where did you see these?!? I haven’t… I haven’t seen anthing like this…. Well, i’m not sure i’ve ever seen it written like this. He’d know for sure, but this shouldn’t be here. We haven’t used these since before. Well, before earth. I din’t know htye could be written down.”
Team Free Will only seemed to catch half of the demon’s mutterings; he referanced a lot of things they didn’t follow, and made no attempts to excplain.
“I am …. /not/ the expert on this, not remotely, but there’s missing pieces to this. Are you sure you copied it all?”
He just distrusting looks back, but didn’t seem offented, “Look, i get not giving me the whole thing, I wouldn’t show it to me either. But theirs defiantly part missing its lie youre showing me jsut the nouns to a sentance, and miming out he verbs as you think i’ve gotten to them while reading. Never mind everythign else you need for a sentace.
“I can’t translate this for you if i’ve only got the nouns. What is this eve for?”
--
They finally give crowley the comeplete copies.
The demon shakes his head, sitting cross legged as he looks the sheets over, :Still not all heere boys. But. i;ll explain what youve given me for a phone call. Certainly i deseve a phone call, yea?”
“Sorry, frsh out of blood.”
Even behind the sades, dean can see his bewillerement. “Waht…. OH!! Oh, no no no Like. A phone call. with a mobile. Warlock, remember? I’m /very/ late at this point.”
“I;m not just letting you phone a freind.”
“So call te Ritz yourself. As for Warlock.”
“By name?”
“Yes.” he says it in confusion, like he’s not sure why it was a question in the first place.
It takkes a minute to google the Ritz London. They don;t have a plan for international calls, but Crowley asks why they would need one, just call.
The weirdest part is that it works.
Sam asks them if they have a guest named Warlock, who might be waiting for someone.
The do.
A man answers, “This is Warlock.”
He sounds their age, and he sounds worried.
“Hello?”
Croely calls out from across the room, heard perfectly over the phone beucse he doesn’t expect diffrently, “Warlock dear, its Nanny.”
“Nanny, where /are/ you? Are you okay?”
“Perfectly fine love,” the demons voice is pitched softer, but otherwise unaltered, “Just got a bit tied up with things. You know how work gets.”
The man chuckled, “You’re supposted to be retried”
“No rest for the wicked”
“Ypu;re not going to make it tonight, are you?”
Crowly looks at his capturs. They stare back, “‘Fraid not love. But don’t worry, we’ll meet up next week.”
Dean’s ready to hang up, but Warlocks voice calles out, one last question. “Nanny, should I call Adam?”
Crowleys look to the hunters is dark and steeled, “No need to bother him just yet, dear.”
“Can you take me off speaker? Who ever has the phone?”
Crowley looks curios, and Dean does, holding up the speaker to his ear. He still doens’t say anything.
“Nanny seems to think you aren’t worth smiting outright.” the voice says, cold. “So i’m not calling in favours yet, becuase /I/ think he needs the distraction. But you’re gonna let Him call me tomorrow, or i will level whatever little holw you;ve crawled into. And when I’m done calling in the airstrick, i’m gonna have the bloody anticrhsit himself come by personally to bring him home. Whatever fucked up game you think you’re playing, you’ve already lost by stealing him. You can’t hurt him in anyway way that matters, but i can still very much hurt you. So tread /very/ carefully, /hunter/”
---
The demon shook his head. “I dout you’re being dusibulous at this point, so maybe the lines are hidden. Soemthing etched under the surface. Maybe like...braille? Ya now.”
he’s tristing the pages in curiousyl, spead out like a puzzle. The flames have been put out, but the oil is stil there at the outside of the trap, ready to light again.
“Okay - so, if we… isolate touch, we sould be able to feel the rest of the bidning - i asuume this is a binding? Yeah, it looks liek one. We don’t wanna turn it off jsut yet - might have a backlash being storied. - nothing here /stops/ power, but is a da,mn. So if its binding - say hellfire, then if you just turn off touch, then youre gonna have hella hot, invisade, sentless hell fire that’s gonna burn everything it touches. So we… muffle it a bit.
“It’s be warm, but as long as your not an angel it wont catch anythign on fire. Is it hellfire? I wonder if you ciuld do it to holy water. Make it safer to move around, if you could bind just touch. No accidental melting. Would come in handy - that.
“Until its time to use it. That could be an issue - if it takes too much to unbind….”
Castiel stood watch outside the cricle, listening to the demon ramble. He seemed comeyly at ease in his trap, taking aimlessly and at great length. We would talk at his captors, but ddin’t seem offened or hurt when no one tlaked back to him.
He was at ease, but Castiel could feel a long set dispare set within him. He didn’t like that he recognised this emotion from the deep seated distress that had long sense taken hold of the winchesters, didn’t like that the part of him that was quick to sooth it from the humans has asking if he was going todo the same for the demon.
The phone call had been most cursio, and while Castiel sensce to decet of double meanings from the demon, the man on the otherseide has left them all on the wrong foot. Who /was/ this ‘warlock’ and who the hell was he meaning bu the antichrist?
“Look, Look, angel,” the demon waved at him, and he recoiled out of arms reach. The demon actually looked hurt by that, “i see. Sorry.”
He handed a paper to Castiel instead. “This should clamp down ont he touch part. See if you can find any
--
“So ypure mystery spells in here, yeah?”
All three spun un heel to where their unwanted quest set resting against the door frame. Shades still obscured his face, but he grined like the cat who got he crem
“How did you get out?!”
“Should have lite thef ire gain. I don’t acytakly know if it would have kept me, but lines of the floor only work if the demon in them believes they’d work. But don’t worry, most of them do.”
“That’s not how it works,” Sam started, the demon coscking his head in a manner too similaors to Castiels.
“Tall human, that how /everything/ works. Escpeailly with us. Belief is 9/10ths of the law. You humans might have a few more laws, but those only work becuase you expect hem too. And even when you believe in them comepletely, you still spend all your energy finding new ways to brea them”
Dean was shaling his head in disbelif, and Sam just looked at him dumbly.
“Look, it’s not your fault, i mean, the apple did a lot to get you all thinking around the rules, but most jsut aren’t made to think outside the box.” He looked directly at Castiel, “No offense. So, what mystery item are we working on?”
He’s pearing around them; the rescude andel on full display. But curiosuly, the demon doesn’t even seem to notice.
---
The spell provided works. But castiel isn’t sure how to writie the feeling down, and they agree to allow the demon in the room.
Only becuase the sigisl that keep the angel from castiels celestial visin seems to hide him from the demon completly.
What’s curisos is that it /didn;t/ keep it hidden from their crwly.
They waited until after crowleys check in with the mystery warlock. The man called them this time (time to burn this phone)
Corwley still remained blind to the angel, instead reading the air for the spell work not visible to human eyes. Old Guard Magic.
Crowley wriggled his fingers, and Sam begrudgingly took his handm leading his questing fingers to the line or binding across angelis skin. When the demons hand touched flesh though, all jokes and jovial mood dropped way, and the demon jerked awy, face tweisted in rage, “WHat is tthis? You’ve bound a /person?/ are they evens tilla ive? That’s… thatosn inhuman!”
The outrage was surprising, so much so, that they didn’t react intime as the demon hsoved them away, surging forward to trace the sigil of touch. The demon was carefully feeling out the lines of the spell, working blindly, but deftly, pulling at weavings only he and castiel had been able to feel.
“We found him this way,” Dean said findly, looking warily, as the demon knelt before their strand ward, Castiel watching over his work.
The angel on the ground shivered, the first movement of its own as the demon drew away from his chest. The humans watched the sigil burned into its chest glow yellow around the edges. The mark remained, otherwise unchanged. For the first time, the chest rose and fell, like the angel handled taken a breth the entire time it was bound. It shuddered under the demons hands, but otherwise it remained unmoving.
“Easy, child,” the demons soothed, the body still hidden form him, but carefull feeling out the curve of the body, finisng the shoulder, “shhhh. It’s alot at once, i know. I know..”
((owrks delibratly slow, as to not have the wave of touch become overwhealming))
---
The dmon had gotten back ito the room. Castiel wanted to be annoyed, but the demon just held the hands blindly in hiswon, whicpering words the other angel still couldnot hear, pressing patterend into the hands. “What are you doing?”
“Talking”
“He can’t ehar you.”
“Not all humans can hear,” the demon said carefully. “Jsut like some don’t talk. At least not with voices. But humans are so very clever. They use hands to say words.”
Castil watched him continue paterns into the hands, “What are yu telling him?”
“That he’s safe. That we;ll get this ward off him.”
“ANd he knows these words. With your hands?”
“Dunno. But i think the intent comes across. If he’s smart, then he ‘ll relaise its a pattern. He’ll know somoens talkign to him.”
---
The emon froze hands pausein where he’d cupped the side of the man’s face. His fingers tips just brushed the soft wite curls above the angels ears, but the demons face was frozen in mute horror.
His other hand pulled away from th spell, cupping the otherseideof the face. He turned to Castiel, then to Dean and then to Sam.’It.s…. Please? Is it….”
He shook his head madely, tears starting to run down sheecks from under the sunglasses.
“I dont…” sam wasnt; sure what o say, and dean hated the look of loose and terrified hope on the face of a heireditary enime.
“He;s not.. Its not a human, is it.:
No one moved for a long lok, not wanted to confirm or dienie. What waould a dmeon do, with a helpless angel?
The dmeon didn;t seem to need an answer, fingers touching soft cirls, “Angel?”
They couldn’t see eacher other, couldnt hear each other. Couldn;t even smell each other. But they could feel each other now, and even lcoked awy in his own mind, the soft touches had drawn him out, and the hands holding him now, one of the last good things he could remember feeling, so veyr vyer long ago.
“Crowley?”
---
Wood/green (sight) Fire/red (taste) Earth/yellow(touch) Metal/white(smell) Water/black(hearing)
