Chapter 17
Sam rubbed his eyes tiredly but didn’t look away from the screen nonetheless.
He didn’t sleep since the ship disappeared. Which was three days ago.
He couldn’t allow himself to relax until he finds a way to bring his brother and Tony back.
He could feel Natasha’s worried looks on him every few seconds and the occasional disapproving frown from Castiel when he handed him a new cup of coffee every two hours.
Jane Foster was being a great help. She was so absorbed with Clint and Natasha in studying the ship’s files and wasn’t planning to relax until she find something.
“Oh, God!” came Charlie’s sudden panicked gasp that made all of them jump and look at her in worry.
“What? What happened?” Steve questioned coming towards here in concern.
She took a few deep calming breaths before she could answer.
“I-I fed the computer with Tony and Dean’s pictures to search through the journalistic bibliography through all history, for any information about them that reached the news in whatever era they were in.” she explained, hands shaking a little.
“Did you find anything from that?” Natasha asked when she came towards her with the others.
“I found one picture. And it freaked me out.” She said looking carefully at Sam and Castiel.
“What picture?” Clint asked impatiently.
She clicked on something, then on the screen, appeared a page from an old French newspaper that was dated during WWII and Charlie pointed at a picture on the left side of the page.
“This one.” Then the screen zoomed in on the picture so it was now filling it completely, and Charlie’s voice shook a little. “Dean’s picture.”
They all froze as they stared with wide, horrified eyes at the picture, that showed Dean unconscious on a hospital bed, next to him stood a German General. Under the picture, it was written that one of the leaders of the French resistance was caught by the Germans who ordered his-
-Execution.
“Holy shit! That fucking ship took them to France during WWII!” Clint cried in horror as he stared at the picture.
“Execution?!” Sam gasped sharply and took a step back as he felt himself panicking, his breath was coming in harsh gasps, and his whole body was shaking in panic. He was aware of Natasha gripping his shoulders and shaking him in attempt to bring him back and Bruce’s calming voice talking to him.
But he couldn’t calm down. His brother was caught by the Nazis and they were going to (Or already did) execute him.
Meanwhile, Castiel stood stock still as he stared at the picture, unable to look away from it. All his emotions were harshly frozen. He felt Steve’s hand on his shoulder and Steve’s worried eyes glancing at him.
“Did you follow that report? Did they-“ Steve asked, unable to finish his sentence.
“Yes, I looked at all the next issues of the newspaper but they never mentioned it again. Even the German newspapers at that time never mentioned that report. Like they didn’t care about the execution of one of the leaders of the French Resistance in any way.”
“Maybe that means that they failed to execute him?” Thor asked hopefully.
“Or nobody cared about his execution.” Charlie murmured bitterly.
Castiel’s eyes moved towards the General’s face who was standing next to Dean in the picture, and stared at him intently.
“Can you enlarge the General’s face?” Castiel asked Charlie in a strangely calm voice.
Charlie complied and started to press a few buttons then the General’s face filled the screen.
Castiel’s eyes widened in pure terror and flinched back violently like he was slapped harshly, making everyone in the room look at him in confusion.
“Oh, no.” he breathed out, looking on the verge of pure panic. “This can’t be happening. No.”
He should’ve known that his past will caught up with him. He should have prepared himself for that. He shouldn’t have thought that his past won’t come and punch him harshly in his face.
He should have known that his happiness was short lived.
He was aware that he was probably full on panicking, if the voices calling for him was anything to go by. Then he felt two strong hands gripping his shoulders tightly and pulling him back to the present to find Steve’s eyes looking at him with concern as he gripped his shoulders, while everyone was surrounding him and looking at him in worry.
“Cas? What’s gotten into you? Do you know this man?” Steve asked looking at him intently.
Castiel trailed his eyes around the room, trying to calm himself long enough to answer.
“I don’t just know him.” Castiel muttered, staring back at Steve, looking defeated. “I faced him before.”
“What?” Sam was looking at him in shock.
“If they are facing that man.” Castiel continued, looking dazed. “Then they are in grave danger. They might not survive it.”
***
The subway was coming towards them with its full speed and there was no place for them to take cover.
When suddenly, the metal door opened and a strong hand appeared then gripped the both of them inside harshly and closing the door behind them.
When the subway’s noise died out as it reached its station that was filled with angry German soldiers, the owner of the hand turned on a large flashlight on their faces and pointed at them a machine gun.
“Who are you? And why did you do what you did?” he asked harshly in French.
“You mean why we entered the subway’s tunnel?” Sydney asked nervously.
“No, I mean what you just did with the Germans.”
Tony and Sydney shared a quick look before the former answered: “We didn’t have papers.”
“Why?”
“That’s what happened.”
“What do you mean by that? Everyone have identification papers. Even us!”
Tony was getting nervous as he tried to remember everything Steve told him about this era and was trying to not think about what just happened outside.
“Where can we find Alain and Brigitte?” he asked bluntly, making the man tense and furrow his brow without answering but he continued: “You are from the French Resistance, right?”
The man leaned towards him and poked him in the chest with his gun.
“Who are you? And how do you know Alain and Brigitte? Say the truth!”
“If I told you the truth, you won’t believe a single word. All you need to know right now is that I am not a spy and I mean no harm in any way.”
The man stared at him for a while then turned his eyes towards Sydney.
“And you?” he asked harshly.
“Same as him.” she answered with a shrug.
He trailed his eyes between them for a second.
“There is only one way to settle this.” he decided while looking at them sharply, then he locked the metal door from inside and pushed them in front of him harshly. “For you to face Brigitte herself.”
The three of them walked through a very complicated net of tunnels and corridors that indicated that their guide knew his way completely.
“Do you really know this Brigitte?” Sydney whispered in his ear carefully.
“Well, no.” he admitted nervously. “I heard a lot about her though.”
“From who?”
“Steve made an alliance with the French resistance. They helped each other a lot and he was a very good friend to the resistance’s two leaders and he told me everything about them and about the resistance.”
“What, are you going to try and claim that you are friends with Captain America in this era and you expect them to believe you?!”
“We’ll see, just follow my lead, okay?”
They were silent for the rest of the walk, which unfortunately, led his mind to be very aware of the absence of a certain Winchester. Immediately, his heart ached with unbearable pain. He just lost Dean. He lost his best friend. One of his family. The only one connecting him to his home. With Dean gone, an unbearable feeling of loneliness filled him completely. He was alone, seventy years or more away from home. Sure, Sydney was here, but he didn’t really know her. He was barley holding up when Dean was with him. He felt a little comfort when the oldest Winchester was by his side. He certainly knew more than Tony how to handle situations like these. But now? He was terrified, alone and have no idea what to do.
God, what is he going to tell Castiel and Sam if he ever managed to return home? That he left his best friend to die at the hands of the Nazis?
“We’re here.” The man said sharply, cutting Tony’s thoughts.
He looked up and saw a light at the end of the tunnel, as they got closer, the light got clearer until they reached a large room, filled with a number of men and women that looked at them with nervousness.
Then a woman came forward to stand before them. She was a pretty blond with blue eyes. The type Tony would have gone after before. But he was a happily married man now to a blond, gorgeous, blue-eyes beauty. So, he wasn’t affected by the woman in the slightest.
“Who are they?” she asked their guide firmly.
“They are the ones that fought the Germans outside.” he answered in obvious respect. “They were trying to escape through the subway, like they knew where they were going.”
“So you brought them here?!”
“If they are spies we can just kill them right her-“
“You must be Brigitte.” Tony interjected suddenly.
The woman looked at him sharply.
“Do you know me?” she snapped harshly.
“He said he knew you and Alain and-“ the man tried to explain but she stopped him with a wave of her hand.
“Tell me: do you know me?” she asked again with a sharp glare.
“No, not personally. But I know a lot about you from a-a friend of mine.”
“And who is that friend.”
“Captain America.”
“Oh! So you are trying to tell me that you are friends with Captain America and he told you everything about me?”
“Yes, I-“
“Enough!” she cut him off angrily. “Your silly attempt at lying exposed you. You are spies!”
Tony frowned nervously while Sydney just sighed.
“I knew they wouldn’t believe that.” She muttered blankly.
Brigitte glared at her then turned towards their guide.
“Bernard! Kill them!”
Without hesitation, he raised his machine gun towards their faces.
***
The moment General Friedrich Holdstein’s car stopped in front of that small hospital in the heart of Paris, tension and urgency filled the place as his soldiers spread out everywhere to secure the place, not caring about the patients around them.
In firm calmness, the general got out of his car and trailed his eyes around the place with sharp eyes before entering the hospital.
He was a tall, strong man with sharp, cold blue eyes. His steps were long and strong, indicating his strong personality and high confidence, as he made his way towards a room at the end of the corridor, which was guarded by three soldiers who immediately straightened up the moment they laid eyes on the general and raised their arms together shouting “Hail Hitler.” In greeting.
The general ignored them completely while he pushed open the door and entered the room.
Carl Mannheim turned towards him inside the room and greeted him the same way.
“I hope whatever this is was, worth me coming here, Carl.” He said harshly. “I will be sad to send you off to the Soviet front again after I just brought you back from there.”
“I am confident that you will not regret bringing me back to Paris, sir.” Carl stated strongly.
The general looked at him coldly for a few seconds.
“So it is worth it, then.”
“Of course!” then he pointed at Dean who was unconscious on the bed. “That man is from three people who engaged with our men an hour ago when they asked them for their identification papers.”
“I don’t think you called me here for this.” Holdstein said while taking off his gloves.
“Of course not, sir. Such thing doesn’t matter to us in anyway and definitely won’t led us to take the injured man to the hospital immediately to do a surgery on him to save his life.” Then he straightened up firmly. “But this man is definitely not ordinary.”
“Why?”
“I will tell you the whole story, sir.” For a whole fifteen minutes, Carl told the story from the moment the ship appeared in the sky, till the fight in the street that ended with Tony and Sydney’s escape and Dean’s fall. “We could have never linked the two men and woman with the ones that fought with the search party in the street if not for one thing.”
The general glanced at Dean curiously before asking: “And what is that?”
Carl pointed at Dean’s wrist: “His watch.”
“His watch?!” the general repeated as he glanced at it in confusion.
“Yes, sir. We tried to remove it from his wrist but it electrified anyone who tried. Take a look at it, sir. And tell me if you ever saw something like this.”
Holdstein gripped Dean’s wrist and raised it up to look at the watch, he furrowed his eyebrows as he saw the very advanced and complicated looking watch.
“What the hell is this thing?” he muttered in confusion.
It was impossible to see something like this in this era.
But somehow it felt familiar to Holdstein. Like it triggered something deep in his mind.
A series of images passed quickly through his mind. Images from another eras. Different times. Huge black wings. All merged together in his brain in a way that confused him.
“What is this thing?” he repeated again in frustration.
Just then, Dean started to groan and rambled a few words in his sleep.
The words included a name.
The name of the last person he thought about before he lost his consciousness.
Castiel.
The moment the name pierced Holdstein ears, his body jerked violently and his eyes widened.
And in his mind, a bomb exploded.
A bomb of events and memories exploded suddenly from a dark spot in his brain. It affected his entire being.
The explosion in his brain made him jerk again and swear loudly.
“Did- did I do something wrong, sir?” Carl hesitated as he looked at him.
Holdstein turned towards him sharply, his eyes brightening in a scary way as he stared at him like he was seeing him for the very first time.
After a long moment of silence he finally started to regain his bearings again.
“Not at all, Carl.” He answered in excitement then turned back towards Dean. “Give this man all the medical care you can provide. I want him back to his feet as soon as possible.” then his voice turned firm and sharp. “And when he wakes up, I want to interrogate him myself.” His eyes were terrifying as he turned towards Carl. “Myself, Carl!”
Carl shivered as he stared at the general. “Yes, sir.”
He shivered again as he looked at the general’s eyes. he felt like he was staring at the devil himself.