Chapter 12

"You know," Lucifer says, "it occurs to me that you're not working with all the facts."

Dean crosses his arms. "And what would those facts be?"

"Well," he says, "it's entirely possible that I exaggerated Michael's... condition."

"What are you talking about?" Gabriel asks. "What's up with Michael? Is he okay?"

"Yes."

Gabriel stares at him for a moment. "Is there more to that?"

Lucifer just shrugs.

"What do you mean, he's okay?" Sam asks. "Okay physically?"

"He's in Hell, dumbass," Lucifer says. "There is no physically in Hell."

"You know what I mean," Sam snaps. "You said he was insane."

"And, again, that may be slightly exaggerated," Lucifer says.

"Just how insane is he?" Dean demands.

"Oh, you know..." Lucifer shrugs awkwardly. "He's not."

Dean scoffs. "You mean to tell me this whole time we've been dealing with one or two archangels, we could have had three? The only one missing is Raphael, and you're just telling us this now?"

"Oh, come on," Lucifer says. "Like you wouldn't have done the same. You and I both know that you wouldn't have come to get me if you knew you could have gotten a fully functioning Michael instead."

Dean just glares at him, but doesn't respond, so Jo steps in with, "Well, he's not wrong."

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Balthazar asks. "Let's go get Michael."

"Woah, okay hold on," Ellen says quickly. "Last time we saw Michael, he tried to blow up half the planet. You can't seriously be talking about pulling him out, too, just like that."

"You grabbed me," Lucifer reminds her. "And, last time I checked, the apocalypse wasn't a one-man job."

"We've got you on a leash." Dean nods at Crowley to remind him. "I don't think we can pull that on Michael."

"And he's not the type to listen to orders that come from anyone but the big man upstairs," Gabriel adds. "I mean, I love the guy, but I don't see him working with us on this."

"Of course he would," Lucifer says. "Dad told us to lock the Darkness up once. You think Michael's gonna need him to say it again? As long as you can stop him from murdering you when he realizes you freed her in the first place, he'll play along just fine."

Sam scoffs. "Do you really think telling us he might murder me is going to convince us to bring him out?"

"Oh, you freed her?" Lucifer chuckles. "Yeah, scratch that. He won't lay a hand on you."

"Oh, but the rest of us are fair game?" Dean says skeptically. "Not your best cover-up."

"Michael likes him," Lucifer says. "You know, in a weird sort of way. They were roommates for a while, you know."

"So were we," Sam says. "And if he's anything like you..."

"He's not," Lucifer says. "Scout's honor."

Sam and Dean share a look, then both look to Castiel. No one had acknowledged him during this conversation, and he wasn't exactly rushing in to contribute. In the real world, they probably wouldn't have asked him at all, and if they did, they probably wouldn't really care what he said. That's how it usually goes. The is an interesting change, and one he could get used to.

But that means he has to figure things out.

With what he knows of his own universe, even Chuck said Michael was insane, and he's more than willing to take God's word for it. But Chuck never showed up here, so they don't have that. Maybe this is another thing that changed between worlds. How Dean and Castiel's relationship could have saved Michael's sanity, he's not quite sure, but at this point, he's desperate.

"What do we have to lose?" Castiel says finally.

He knows the answer, though. If this goes wrong, he knows what he'll lose. It's not his life — perks of living in a djinn dream; it's not exactly Inception.

But it might be worse.

In Inception, when you die in the dream, you die in real time. In a djinn dream, you die in the dream, and your dream dies, too.

And he would do anything to keep from losing the love of his life.

A/N *spongebob narrator voice* ten months later...

I'm gonna work on finishing this fic up soon because I feel bad every time someone reads it and asks me to update and I don't even remember what the fic's about so hopefully by the end of the month (but realistically probably by like April if I don't lose motivation again) I'll try to wrap this up so it's not just kinda sitting here half finished for the rest of eternity :)