Chapter Text
It took until the third tug for Sam to realize what, exactly, was happening. He’d worked hard to keep his name under wraps after taking over Hell from the prior administration, and to the best of his knowledge, humans still called on Lilith or Crowley when they wanted to deal with the manager of Hell. Crowley showed up no matter which one they called for, explaining that Hell was under new management and he would be happy to assist in whatever manner they wished, meaning that Sam – now Samael – was free to get on with actually managing Hell. All the tedium that had bored Crowley to tears, Sam enjoyed digging his fingers into. Finally doing something useful with the law degree he’d almost been able to start before his life got so thoroughly hijacked.
The tug asserted itself again, and Sam was curious enough to follow it. If nothing else, he could figure out how someone had gotten his name and bypassed all the redirects he and Crowley had set up. As he materialized in the summoning circle, he looked around, taking stock of the environment.
It appeared to be a bedroom, in the basement of a house. Judging by the posters on the wall… actually, the mixture of motivational kittens, Evanescence and Linkin Park, and hand-drawn angels didn’t help much with narrowing down an age range or gender. The harp in the corner of the room at least indicated a physically grown or mostly-grown person, although it might have been aspirational. It was well-cared for, at least. There was a stuffed bee on the bed, its sunshine yellow contrasting with the darkness of the space-themed bedding.
The person standing in front of him was clearly his summoner. “Hello, Samael.”
A young man, about eighteen. Dark hair that he’d clearly tried to tame but had already gotten mussed. Wearing a suit and tie, although the tie was tied badly and hanging backwards. The weirdest thing, though, was the bouquet of tulips he held. That was not part of the summoning ritual and made no sense. “Hello?”
“That… is the phrase, even for addressing you, is it not?” He cleared his throat and tilted his head. “I’m sorry. I’m bad enough with people; any mistakes of protocol I make are out of ignorance rather than disrespect.”
“Hello is fine. I’m just confused.” And unable to fully resist the smile. Whoever this guy was, he was kind of adorable. “How about we start with you giving me your name?”
He shook his head. “I was told this ritual would summon the King of Hell, not the King of the Faeries. Why do you want my name?”
The smile grew. “I didn’t mean it in a faerie sense. Let me rephrase. What should I call you?”
“Oh!” The redness of his face made the blue eyes practically glow. Sam had to admonish himself that he was not here… well, probably not here, but they were going to get to that part of things eventually… to develop a crush. “My name is Castiel Delossantos.”
“Hello, Castiel.” For some reason, Castiel went even redder. “How can I help you?”
“I know I’m supposed to make this a whole big thing to record for social media, but as I don’t have social media, that hardly makes sense to me. So instead, is it okay if I just ask?”
Sam bit back his first answer, that in order to know the answer to that he really needed to know what he was being asked for. “I don’t know about the recording, but you went to all the trouble to find my name and the correct ritual to summon me. I think you’ve earned the right to ask whatever it is you’re asking.”
“Ah.” Castiel hesitated, fidgeting with the bouquet of flowers. “It came to me in a dream. All my life, there’s been something or someone answering my biggest life dilemmas through dreams. What electives to take, what instrument to take up, what path through high school fit me best… I even got an answer to where to go to college from a dream, and the very next day, a full-ride scholarship offer arrived from Stanford. The day after, another scholarship offer – this one from a private investor, being given to me to pay for housing, food, all the things necessary to subsist that a typical scholarship doesn’t cover.”
Sam held back the frown. This had meddling angel or demon fingerprints all over it, and he would have to investigate once he was free to do so. It wasn’t Castiel’s fault, then. “So… what question was summoning me meant to answer?”
“Right.” Castiel held the flowers out to Sam. “Will you go to prom with me?”
Something in Sam’s brain short-circuited. He could not have heard what he thought he just heard. He also desperately needed to dig into who was giving this guy these dreams. “Why would you want to go to prom with the King of Hell?”
Castiel shrugged. “I have no friends to go with. The only classmate to ask me, it turned out, had done so as a consequence of losing a bet. I can’t just skip, and showing up alone only guarantees that I will spend a very long, very lonely evening completely excluded from something I should be a part of. That would be worse than skipping.”
“Uh… what’s so bad about skipping? I skipped mine… although, admittedly, that wasn’t the original plan.” Sam winced at the reminder of one of the worst days of his life, when he’d gotten all ready to go to prom and arrived at Rachel’s house to find her parents thoroughly embarrassed as they tried to stop him from going upstairs. They didn’t even know it was his brother she was in bed with. “Lots of people skip prom.”
“Maybe, but… it’s part of the high school experience. If I’d gone last year, I might feel better about this year, but the idea of graduating high school and never having been to prom gives me a deep sense of existential dread.”
“And your dream sent you to me. Specifically me, not just some random, easier to summon demon.” Sam was starting to get a sneaking suspicion, and if it was true, he might just need to invade Heaven.
Castiel nodded. “Along with a message for you: ‘quit being an emo bitch and take a second chance.’ I have no idea what it means.”
“It means that there’s about to be a goddamn war between Heaven and Hell, because after I take you to prom, I need to go kick someone’s ass,” Sam grumbled as he took the tulips from Castiel. “Don’t worry about it. Yes, I will go to prom with you.”