The (J2) French Mistake - a fic (in 2 parts)

[amberdreams]

The (J2) French Mistake - Part 1

Title: The (J2) French Mistake

Authoramber1960

Characters: Jared, Jensen, Bobby Singer, Raphael, Ben Edlund (Gen)
Rating: PG-13

Words: c 6800
Summary: Season 6 – what happened to the ‘real’ Jensen and Jared when Sam and Dean took their places in that reality?  What if they actually swapped places with Sam & Dean and found themselves in a real Supernatural environment (not talking to each other)?

Warnings: Some swearing

 

 

As they crashed through the window, Jensen was anticipating a perfect take.  It was late in a long day, and this scene was supposed to be the last, as Bob had said this stage was set up for a single take.  And it was perfect, until his shoulder crunched into what felt like solid concrete instead of the anticipated landing cushion, and he heard Padalecki’s anguished yell echo his own.

 

“Fuck!”

“Shit!”

 

 

Jensen gingerly rolled onto his side, then flinched as a sliver of glass sliced through Dean’s denim jacket and pierced his bicep (what the fuck, real glass again? What were the set designers thinking?  And come to that, he missed the old leather jacket.).  Preoccupied with carefully pulling the shard out, he didn’t notice that the studio was darker than it should have been, and even more strangely, it was raining.  With blood smeared on his fingers, he waved the offending piece of glass around and complained loudly to all and sundry.

 

“Look at this!  I’m bleeding, fuck it!”

 

All and sundry were strangely silent, and Jensen’s outraged grumbles were met only by a brilliant flash of lightning closely followed by a clap of thunder so loud the tall actor was abruptly shocked into silence.

 

That freaking giant, Padalecki, was already on his feet, looming over him like the leaning tower of Pisa, blocking Jensen’s view of – well everything, actually. 

 

When Jensen stood up, pressing a hand to the throbbing cut in his arm, he rather wished he’d stayed behind the shelter offered by Padalecki’s broad back.  He looked around in total bewilderment, taking in the night-time darkness, the lightning flashes that were illuminating what looked like the outdoors set they used for Bobby Singer’s junkyard.  Indeed as he rotated slowly around, there was what appeared to be a complete version of house they used to double as Bobby Singer’s house (exterior views only).  The storm they were in the middle of seemed to be growing in force, the wind was whipping last year’s dead leaves around and setting Dean’s multiple layers flapping, and the rain was getting heavier.

 

“What the fuck?” Jensen muttered to nobody, seeing as how he and Padalecki were not talking, and everyone else seemed to have vanished into thin air.

 

Lightning flashed again, far too close for comfort, and in the afterglow that seared his retinas the run down clapboard house, with its wrecked window gaping open to the angry elements, suddenly took on the menacing aspect of one of those dark turreted nineteen century houses they always used in bad horror flicks.  He supposed a transforming house could be no stranger than anything else that was happening to them as he shrugged the after-image out of his brain.

 

Padalecki had turned around and was mouthing some nonsensical shit about multi-verses or something.  Jensen could only make out every other word over the shrieking volume of the growing storm, so he dismissed it as the crazed ramblings of a sci-fi geek.  That was until he saw Lanette Ware emerging from amidst an impossible roiling mass of blue lightning right behind Padalecki. 

 

So, possibly not Lanette then, maybe more like an Archangel of the Lord in full smiting mode.

 

Unfortunately, Jensen had no trouble hearing Raphael’s voice as it seemed to be resounding inside his skull, and it sounded as though she was pissed.

 

“What is the meaning of this? Where is Balthazar?” She demanded.  Then her voice dropped an octave into pure icy menace.  “And where are the Winchesters?”

 

Everything seemed to happen at once, yet in slow motion.  Jensen saw Padalecki start to turn around, as Raphael raised her hand and a brilliant white glow began to form in her palm.  However insane Jensen’s rational brain was telling him this was, he knew instinctively that this was real.  An Archangel was about to smite them, smite Jared, and all of a sudden, his aching shoulder and his childish grudges paled into insignificance.

 

Jensen didn’t hesitate. He leapt forward and grasping his co-star by one muscled shoulder he yanked with all his might.  Padalecki went flying to one side, toppling like a giant redwood, out of the path of the beam of light that shot straight through the space where he had been, right into Jensen’s face.

 

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Jared had gone from excited to terrified all in the space of ten short seconds.  Excited when he’d understood that they had somehow managed to personally prove the Many Worlds theory by crossing a boundary between two parallel universes; something he couldn’t resist trying to explain to Ackles even though they weren’t speaking, not since The Incident.  Terrified when he saw his co-star’s face turn first pale then determined, the changing expressions clearly illuminated by the bright blue-white light and in reaction to the deeply scary voice that materialised directly behind Jared.

 

Unlike Ackles, Jared had read Edlund’s script very thoroughly, so he knew exactly who it had to be behind him, and why she was there.  The sense of menace was immediate and sent a chill down his spine.  Distracted by Raphael’s arrival, Jared missed the significance of Jensen’s determined expression and was taken by surprise when his volatile co-star moved as quick as Dean Winchester, thrusting Jared out of the way, putting himself right into the line of fire.

 

Helpless, Jared could only watch from the floor as Raphael’s angel-light smote Jensen, spinning the six one actor backwards as effortlessly as if he had been weightless.  It was nothing like watching a special effect. This was terrifyingly real and the sound of Jensen’s head hitting the all too solid wall of Bobby Singer’s house made Jared feel like throwing up.  Ackles slumped face down to the floor as boneless as a ragdoll and lay unmoving.

 

Shock warred with a growing rage.  Jared squared his broad shoulders and scrambled to his feet to face Raphael.

 

“What the fuck do you think you are doing, you bastard…”

 

Raphael stared at him as if he had sprouted a Zaphod Beeblebrox extra head.  Or was something nasty on the bottom of her highly polished angelic shoes.   She made a gesture with her hand and Jared fell heavily to his knees, his words stilled on his tongue.

 

“You are not the Winchesters.  You are…irrelevant.”

 

Jared choked on his attempt at a response, because the Archangel had somehow turned sound into solid matter, clogging up his gullet and windpipe.  Clutching at his throat, the pain in his knees was forgotten as he struggled against choking.  Raphael shrouded herself once again in lightning and then simply vanished, taking the last vestiges of the storm with her.  The moment she dematerialised, the constriction in his neck disappeared with her and Jared could breathe again. Gulping cold air into his desperate lungs, he crawled as quickly as he could to where his co-star lay unmoving.

 

“Ackles!”  Jared coughed.  His voice sounded as though he’d been smoking 60 a day for at least twenty of his twenty-eight years.  He swallowed and tried again, shaking Jensen by the shoulder.

 

“Ackles, come on man,” he tugged at the heavy form and managed to turn his colleague onto his back, gasping as he took in the stark contrast of Jensen’s dead white skin and the dark red blood that masked half of that handsome face.  “Shit.” 

 

He forgot they weren’t supposed to be speaking, he forgot The Incident.  One hand tentatively touched a cold cheek, patted it awkwardly, the other still fisted tight in Jensen’s layers of rain soaked clothing.

 

“Jensen, hey man, come on, please wake up.”

 

Anxiety and fear were washed away by a huge tide of relief as Jensen’s eyelids fluttered and his eyes opened.

 

“Wha… Jared.  Gerroff me…”  Jared sat back on his heels, allowing Jensen room to struggle to sit up on his own.  Almost instantly, relief was replaced by exasperation.

 

“You stupid dumb fuck.  When are you going to realise you are not actually Dean Winchester?”

 

The question was rhetorical, so Jared nearly jumped out of his skin when a rough voice answered him.  Especially as it was accompanied by the unmistakable sound of a shotgun being cocked.

 

“Well, that’s very interesting, seeing as how he happens to be wearing Dean Winchester’s meat-suit.  So enlighten me.  If he ain’t my boy Dean, who the hell is he?”

 

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The next few moments were kind of blurry for Jensen.  His eyes were having trouble focusing and his head hurt like a mother.   He saw Jim Beaver talking to Jared, but couldn’t get his head round why Jim was holding that shotgun on his co-star in such a threatening manner.  Jared was talking back, arms waving like a demented windmill as was usual for Jared, though not for Jared being Sam.  This wasn’t part of the script, he thought, confused.  He leaned heavily on the wall of the house as he tried to get to his feet.  He was absurdly pleased when he finally managed to get himself upright, but his feeling of satisfaction was short lived as his knees turned to jello and buckled underneath him.  He landed on his butt, feeling distinctly aggrieved by the loss of dignity, his long legs sprawled out in front of him, his back still propped up by the helpful wall behind him.

 

He must have made some sort of inarticulate noise of pained protest, as the other two men suddenly quit arguing or whatever the hell they’d been doing and turned their attention to him. ‘Bout time, Jensen thought, a touch petulantly.  He waved a hand in a vague gesture.

 

“Jim, what’you doin’ on set, man?”  He tried to ask, but the gruff old actor just gave him a blank look, so Jensen figured perhaps he’d not been as clear as he might have been.  Must have been one hell of a party he was not remembering.  He hadn’t felt this drunk since the last time Steve and Chris had been in Vancouver.  Those dudes knew how to throw one ass-kicking  celebration.  His wandering gaze landed on Jared and he beamed.

 

“Jay bird!”  He grinned at his friend, best friend, bestest friend in the whole world, wondering why he was having to crane his neck even more than usual to see him.  “Anyb’dy ever tell you…Y’re f’kin’ tall, man…,” he grumbled.

 

 “M’head hurts.” He put a hand to the offending member and was fascinated to see it come away covered in blood.  Funny, it didn’t smell like fake blood, and he couldn’t remember spending any time in make-up….  He put a reddened finger into his mouth to the sound of disgusted protest from Padalecki.  Nope, didn’t taste like that shitty fake stuff either.  How odd.  It tasted like iron, like real blood.

 

Jensen’s head snapped back in shock, and his eyes went wide.

 

“M’bleeding!” Now he really was pissed.  Health and Safety would have a field day, the producers would be in deep shit, the show would probably get canned by the CW and he’d be out of work and out on his ass.  Fucking ridiculous.  Come to think of it, he was on his ass anyway.  He frowned.  What the hell was he doing sitting on the floor?  His hand flopped onto his damp thigh, the blood forgotten.  He leaned his head back against the hard surface behind him, feeling confused again.  Then Jared’s anxious face was looming into view, filling up his blurred vision with that Sam-like expression that was a small part pissiness, a large part puppy-dog concern.

 

Jensen giggled, and watched as Padalecki’s expression slid over into almost pure bitch-face.  Score!   He was going to say something extraordinarily pertinent and witty, but was suddenly far too sleepy to do anything but let himself slide slowly and (he had no doubt) gracefully into a sideways slump.  As he let his heavy eyelids close, he thought he heard the two Js (Jim and Jared, J2, J squared, get it?) shouting at him, telling him he couldn’t go to sleep.  Well fuck that, he thought as blackness claimed him.  He was tired.

 

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Bobby looked in exasperation from one doppelganger to the other.  The Sam-one, who’d said his name was Jared Padasomething, looked as though he was about to burst into tears, while the Dean-one had passed out again, which did, Bobby supposed, make him easier to handle.  Easier in one way, harder in another, as this version of his boy was just as solid a lump to try and shift as his own dearly beloved (and apparently currently missing in another world) Winchester. 

 

The veteran hunter sighed.  This Jared character, who seemed to have appropriated Sam Winchester’s body, had spun one of the tallest tales he’d ever heard, but Bobby found himself believing it wholesale.   Which, he concluded, just went to show how far off the reservation their lives had gone in the last few years.  A body swap between dimensions seemed no more absurd than a few angels having a war or Lucifer walking the earth.  He wondered how Sam and Dean were coping in the world belonging to these two pretty boy actors.  Probably a darned sight better than that poor unsuspecting world was coping with them, he thought, with a grim smile.

 

“We ain’t gonna be able to do much for him out here. We need to get him into the house, get him outta those wet things and let me see to that head wound,” Bobby said.

 

“But, but shouldn’t we call 911?” The lanky one (not Sam, Bobby was resolved not to think Sam when he looked at this stranger) stuttered, cell phone already in his hand.  Bobby glared at him.

 

“So what’re you gonna tell them?  My friend here fell through a portal from another universe and got blasted by an Archangel?  Yeah, that’ll go down a storm with the medics.   Come on, Sa…Jared.  I’ve treated far worse than a concussion and a few cuts. You take his shoulders, I’ll take his legs.”

 

Bobby waited as patiently as he could while Jared pulled himself together enough to help the old hunter gather up the unconscious one (Jensen, his name was Jensen) and, staggering a little under the dead weight, carry him into the house.

 

Unfortunately, the fact that some idjits had jumped through his living room/study window meant Bobby’s couch was out of commission, so the two men had to struggle their way upstairs with their inert bundle of damaged goods. In spite of a body that must be a tribute to a vigorous exercise regime equal to Sam’s, even Jared was panting a little by the time they had managed to negotiate the stairs and make their way into the spare room.  Bobby was veritably wheezing, and cursing under his breath for letting himself get so out of condition.  When the hell had that happened anyway?  Old age creeping up on him, the sneaky bastard.

 

After they settled the still unconscious Jensen onto one of Bobby’s spare beds, the old hunter wasted no time.

 

“Get those wet clothes of him while I get the med kid,” Bobby ordered, and not stopping to see if Jared was leaping into action or not, he clattered downstairs to gather up the essentials for a hunter medical emergency, including suture kit and a full bottle of cheap rot-gut.  Bobby’s cupboards were a pharmaceutical cornucopia of the best pain-killers, antibiotics and the like, but in his experience, there was nothing that worked better than whiskey for both doctor and patient.

 

He paused in the doorway when he returned to the boys’ room, arrested by the tableau that met his gaze.  The tall one had managed to get the other one half undressed but clearly the whole affair had been somewhat traumatic for him.  Jared was sitting on the bed with Jensen’s naked torso pressed up against him, the injured man’s head resting on the taller man’s chest.  Jared’s face was a perfect blend of mortification, indecision and concern.  Jensen had his bare arms wrapped tight around Jared, and was pressing his bloody cheek into Jared’s shirt.  The look of blissful contentment on that handsome face had Bobby wishing that these two were really his boys.  The blackmail potential posed by this picture was immense.  Might even stop ‘em going on about that Crowley kiss…

 

He snorted, startling Jared, who took the noise as his cue to start babbling, blushing redder than hellfire.

 

“He sorta woke up but I couldn’t get his jeans off because he…er…,” Jared trailed off, lost for words, so Bobby helpfully finished his sentence for him.

 

“Wanted to snuggle?  Yeah, well I suppose you are the warmest thing in the room, kid.”  Bobby knew that if this clone was anything like his Sam, he was probably the hottest thing in the whole damned house.  Kid radiated heat like a blacksmith’s forge.  A thought which brought him back to the immediate problem – getting these two sorted out so he could find them a way home, and more importantly (to Bobby’s way of thinking anyway) to get his own two idjits safely back from whatever dimension that devious bastard Balthazar had flung them into.

 

Galvanised into action, Bobby wasted no time in efficiently stripping off the last of Jensen’s cold soggy clothing, absently noting the baby-soft smoothness of his skin that was just like Dean’s had been when Castiel first brought him back from Hell.  Or at least it had been nice smooth skin until the actor had arrived here in Winchester-world – once the layers were gone, Bobby found several more lacerations that were going to need stitches, and would likely leave some scars that lovely pale freckled skin.

 

Jared’s blushing together with the contortions the big man was going through to avert his gaze from the nakedness of his co-star was getting irritating, so the hunter despatched the tall actor for more towels and hot water while he stitched up the deep laceration in Jensen’s shoulder.

 

“Towels are in the linen closet just down the hall there,” Bobby said.

Jared looked up and grinned, suddenly appearing years younger. 

“I know where that closet is, Bobby,” Jared said, “It’s where you keep that red hex box, isn’t it?  Raising of the witnesses in season 4 episode 2.”

Jensen, now thoroughly dosed up on Tylenol and raw spirit, attempted to nod agreement, earning himself a slap as the movement nearly jerked the needle out of Bobby’s hand.

 

“Keep still, ya idjit!”

 

Bobby rolled his eyes in the shadow of his grubby ball cap and was muttering to himself as Jared bounced eagerly out of the room.

 

“Just when you think life can’t get any weirder, it throws you an alternate reality curve-ball.”

 

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 Part 2