Twenty-Five - Scramble

"There has to be a loophole, or—or something," Jessica said. She felt the panic squeeze her lungs. This can't be happening. We just killed a big bad, and we're being penalized for it?! "What if we run?"

"When has running done anything for anyone?" Meg asked. "They'll catch whiff of you and not stop until they catch you."

"What if we stay here? They can't detect us, can they?" Charlie asked.

Sam, Dean, and Cas all looked uncomfortable.

"Uh, we, uh, never put new wardings on the place. Kind of hard to find the time to with our busy schedule," Sam said.

"Well, can't we work on them right now and save ourselves the trouble?" asked Jo. "Charlie makes a point; if the wardings are strong, they can't get in here."

"If they're dead-set on taking you and the others back, they'll find a way to destroy them," Cas said gravely.

"So, you're saying there's no point in trying. Great, so it's only a matter of time before they come knocking down the door," Charlie groaned. "Fan-freaking-tastic, guys."

"What if they're bluffing?" asked Jessica. "If there is such a rule, I wanna see the writing."

"And, what? Get a lawyer and go Law and Order on their asses?" Meg scoffed. "If anything, it'll only piss them off more."

"But there has..." Jessica looked to each face in the room. "Somebody work with me here! I can't be spitting out ideas all by myself!"

The prospect of returning to Heaven scared Jessica. She didn't want to go back. That place was boring now. It meant nothing to her. Earth did, this second chance did. She didn't want to go back to being boring. She didn't want to go back to waiting for her Heaven-Sam to return home, to hear about his non-supernatural day.

She didn't want the normal that Heaven offered her anymore. She wanted to make roots here and stay until old age carried her away properly, like she had intended.

"Is it worth trying to fight them, Cas?" Sam asked solemnly.

"Not without making it violent and bloody," said the angel in a trench coat. "It's not what any of us want, for them to leave. But, if it has to be, then it has to be."

Jessica looked at Cas wildly. "You're giving up, just like that? How can you?"

"Our hands are tied, Jessica. There is no outcome of this that's good if we decide to retaliate. Things could get messy and fatal. It's safe to say none of us here want that for anyone, whether it be us or the angels coming for you."

Jessica's head spun. This made no sense to her. She finally found a purpose in this new world, and now she was losing it. She was losing Sam, Dean, and Cas. She'd be losing Jo and Charlie, and hell even Meg. She'd never get to see them again. She'd never get to hunt with them again. They'd never get to kick ass as a team ever again.

The thoughts made her sick to her stomach.

"Jess?" Sam put a hand on her arm, to which she moved away from.

"I can't believe you're all accepting this. You're not even going to try and find a safe option."

"Letting them take you—"

"—is not the safe option, Sam." Jessica looked to her fellow Heaven occupants. "You guys can't give up, either."

"Bargaining isn't an option with them," Charlie muttered. "If that were the case, we wouldn't be having this talk."

Jessica began to pace, and she felt all eyes on her. She didn't care. She wanted to stay alive. She didn't want to go back to Heaven.

"Pacing won't do you good, Malibu. You'll only make ruts in the floor," said Meg.

"Why are you still here?" Jessica snapped. "This doesn't affect you one bit. Why do you give a damn about what happens to us?"

"Oooh, someone's grown some teeth." Meg leapt off the table. "You want me to say it out loud, really? Sorry, I don't do feelings. Not my wheelhouse."

"Unless you plan to murder us all, which really doesn't benefit you in any way, I fail to see a valid reason why you're still here."

"Do you want to die? Keep on poking the bear, Barbie. I'll make sure the angels get you back early."

"Nobody's killing anybody," Sam groaned. "It's clear we don't like what's happening, and there's no nice way to wiggle out of it. We just gotta...we gotta..."

"We should spend what time we have left here properly," piped Charlie. "Like, I don't know, a going away party or something. One last hurrah." The redhead's eyes were sorrowful. Jessica knew she didn't like this idea much, either.

Jessica didn't want to admit it, but really, what choice did they have? Take the fight to the angels and hope for the best? What could come of that, she didn't want to begin to imagine.

"That's not a bad idea," Jo admitted. Jessica looked to the blonde in slight surprise. "I mean, if we can't go back fighting, we might as well make our last day here memorable."

Jessica noticed the unspoken exchange between Jo and Dean. She didn't want to read too much into it. Their business was their business.

The group heard footsteps approach, and all eyes fell onto Alex, Claire, and Jody, who Jessica had briefly forgotten about.

"Whoa, what'd we miss?" asked Claire. Her color was better. Jessica noticed her taking a head count. "Okay, nobody died, so...what's with the depressing air?"

"I was gonna give you guys the rundown later," said Sam.

"You held a secret meeting without us? I mean, we already knew we were on the outskirts of the in-crowd. But, seriously, what's going on?"

"The Three Amigas are being hunted down by Heaven's finest," Meg told the teenager.

"I wouldn't say Heaven's finest—" Cas interjected.

Meg swatted at him to make him shut up.

"Wait...I'm totally lost," said Alex.

"Wouldn't be the first time, would it?" Meg quipped.

"Jo, Charlie, and I, we're...not from around here," Jessica started slowly. "We're not aliens, we...I'm not sure how to explain this."

"They were living in Heaven, I asked for their help to find Sam and Dean," Cas helped Jessica out. "Heaven wants them to return peacefully."

"And you guys?" Jody asked.

"We'd go out fighting, but...As much as we all hate it, we gotta let it be," Dean said hollowly. "We don't know how long we got with them until the winged dicks snatch them back."

Claire's eyes widened. "You guys aren't gonna fight them?" she asked the group. "Did the demons suck out your fighting spirit, too, after they got out of you? You guys are badasses. You can take the fight to them!"

Jessica was glad someone shared that mentality, even though it wasn't the group consensus at this point.

"It'd cause more carnage than it's worth," Dean sighed.

"Don't you guys care about them?! Don't you want to fight for people you care about?"

"We have, we've done it for a long time," Sam said. "But...they lost their lives as a result of us fighting for them. They deserve their peace. I'd rather see them go back to Heaven than die again because of this life."

Jessica glanced at Sam. She could feel his sincerity. It came from a man, she assumed, who had seen far too many friends and loved ones die because of his work. He sounded tired of having the same thing happen repeatedly.

Now Jessica wondered just how high that count was, as morbid as the thought was.

"I mean, we were just gonna see if it was okay if we hunkered here for a bit, since, you know, our house pretty much got torched by demons," Alex said warily. "But, um, I guess this is the worst timing to bring it up."

"No, please, stay," Sam told the three. "We've got plenty of space. What's yours is ours, until you decide to head back."

Jody and the girls nodded thankfully.

"So, this one last hurrah," Meg cut in, "what did you guys have in mind?"