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May. 1st, 2019 10:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amberdreamsA last ditch effort for 
twisted_tropes Dark Roast challenge.
Beta'd by the adorable blindswandive ages ago, I've messed with it since. This is the first thing I've written for an age so forgive me.
Title: The Road to Hell is Paved with Coffee Beans (or Subverting Armageddon, one sip at a time)
Words: c1800
Warnings: I dunno. Poor execution of a fun AU idea? Gencesty.
Rating: Adult
Characters: Sam winchester, Dean Winchester, Meg the demon, Azazel
Summary: Sam wasn't fed demon blood, it was all coffee, all the way.
The Road to Hell is Paved with Coffee Beans (or Subverting Armageddon, one sip at a time)
2005
It was probably two, maybe three years before anyone notices that coffee had changed from the mildly addictive, almost universal drink of choice, to a can’t-live-without-it drug. By then it’s already too late. There are probably some lost tribes in the Amazon rain forests who are uncontaminated, and a handful of people in the developed world who’ve never acquired a taste for the delicious bitterness of the dark roast, but they are few and far between. Way too few to have any influence when Azazel finally springs his trap for the world and for Sam Winchester.
Azazel’s plan is a good one, but it isn’t without flaws. The world might have rolled over, belly up, but the Winchesters don’t get the memo.
There are three factors the Yellow Eyed Demon fails to factor in.
One - Sam Winchester might be an addict, but he is smarter than all his Stanford professors put together, and sharper than the legendary First Blade.
Two - Meg has Daddy issues that make the Winchesters look like the Bradys. When the opportunity arises to stick a wrench in Azazel’s grinder, she doesn’t hesitate. It helps that she loathes coffee. It’s Earl Grey all the way for the YED’s wayward daughter.
Three - Dean Winchester isn’t going to waste good money on coffee when there is whiskey available. No one would have thought being a functional alcoholic would turn out to be an advantage in this life, but sure enough, one addiction trumped the other.
Okay, maybe there are four factors – the fourth being that Dean and Sam Winchester together are an unstoppable force. After John Winchester’s death, Dean rebuilds the family’s vintage coffee machine and discovers the demonic component in the coffee. It isn’t long before he and Sam realise something. If you alter the compound just so, suddenly coffee isn’t Sam’s kryptonite. In fact it’s the opposite. Coffee makes Sam stronger.
Armed with Meg’s insider information, Dean’s special blend and the demon killing blade, the Winchester brothers make their way south, into the heart of Azazel’s dark roast – Colombia.
~0~0~0~
Dean flips the serrated blade with a practiced ease, catching it unerringly by the worn-smooth bone handle every time. He’s not even looking while he plays, his gaze instead fixed on the green and pink flowered sign above the coffee shop door ahead of them. His grin is all teeth.
“Look, Sammy,” he says, “they’ve got Boca Villa, your favourite.”
Sam moves to stand at Dean’s right shoulder, and Dean’s smile widens as he breathes in. Sam gives off a dry, ozone charge that makes Dean’s skin prickle, in an atavistic contrast to the humid heat of the Colombian rain forest that forms a thick curtain around the town. Granonegro might be an innocuous, podunk kind of place, but it’s the centre of Azazel’s operation, and Meg has promised the yellow-eyed schemer will be here, waiting for them.
Dean side-eyes Meg as she takes her place on his left. He doesn’t need to say anything. She knows well enough the demon-killing knife she gifted the Winchesters will find a home in her shrivelled black heart if she betrays them now. That’s if Sam doesn’t suck out what’s left of her soul first and incinerate it.
Dean half hopes she’ll try something. His dick twitches a little in his Jeans, imagining how her pale skin will light up when the knife slides in. She might be helping them, but she’s still a demon, and her daddy is responsible for killing their dad, so…
“Dean.”
Sam’s voice is low, a warning and a reminder both. And, focus, Dean. This ain’t the time or the place.
“Yeah, yeah,” Dean mutters. He’s long past fretting that Sam reads his mind these days with a frightening accuracy. It would be disturbing if it didn’t get Dean so fucking turned on.
When the Winchesters move, it’s in perfect synchronicity. Their shoulders bump as they stride to the coffee shop door. Dean pushes it open and enters first, his brother’s shield and sword.
The café is nothing like an arch villain’s lair. It’s not even very South American. Dean is disappointed. He’d been hoping for something a bit more Indiana Jones-espresso, and this? This is more like a Sheena Queen of the Jungle mochaccino with nut syrup and extra cream.
Large windows and a high ceiling make the room light and airy, while the pale green table cloths and matching green and pink gingham curtains for some reason make Dean think of Mr Rogers. The clientele are a mix of humans and demons, all addicts. Some are so far gone they don’t even glance up from their thousand-mile caffeine stares, lost in the depths of their aromatic cups. The only person who shows any interest in their presence is the barista, a buxom, curvy brunette for whom, under any other circumstances, Dean would have been happy to turn on the charm. Her beetle-black eyes are a bit of a turn-off, though, and her smile is a joyless rictus.
“Ah, Winchesters. The boss is expecting you.”
Meg huffs a laugh and Dean quirks an eyebrow. He doesn’t need to look to know Sam’s smile is more shark-like than any demon could manage. Dean bites his tongue on the Monty Python no one expects the Spanish Inquisition quote, but when Sam steps forward he sees Sam’s eyes crinkle in amusement, as if Dean had said it out loud.
“Somehow I doubt that he’s expecting this,” Sam says to the demon, and brushes her aside with a casual flick of his fingers.
Less than a minute later and the café is wrecked, demons strewn about like so much flotsam in the wake of a Sam-shaped hurricane, and most of the furnishings little more than gingham covered matchwood. Dean rolls his shoulders and grimaces as sweat trickles down his back, adding to the already sizable damp patch on the back of his shirt. Fucking Sam hasn’t even so much as wrinkled his expensive cream linen suit, which was not only impossible but totally unfair.
“A knock would have gotten my attention, Sam, no need to go to all this effort,” Azazel’s drawl, familiar and hated, floats on the bloody dust out of the darkness of the back room, and Sam follows the sound, striding through the doorway. Dean follows, because that’s what he does.
Sam stops just inside the room and Dean bumps shoulders to let Sam know he’s ready, whatever Sam wants. Whatever Sam needs, Dean’s always ready.
“There was no effort involved, believe me.” Sam replies to the demon, his voice giving nothing away.
Azazel rises to his feet, maybe intending to greet them, maybe monologue a bit, the way bad guys always want to.
Sam doesn’t wait to find out which, he just raises one large hand and Azazel starts to fritz like a faulty light bulb. God, but Dean gets all tingly when Sam takes control. Dean cocks his head and watches, fascinated and admiring, as the demon’s eyes flare topaz with fear.
Ah yes. There it is, the moment of realisation for Yellow Eyes. He’s spawned a monster, a dragon born out of flames and blood, and the monster’s name is Sam Fucking Winchester.
Azazel’s meat suit explodes and the room momentarily fills with fiery fragments that whirl about like beans in a blender. Dean blinks away the after-image that’s burnt on his retinas and looks around. The room is empty, save for a heavy pall of arabica-scented smoke, the drop-out, the junkie and the only demon on Team Winchester.
Dean breathes deep. “You smell that, Sammy? That’s the scent of justice.”
Sam shrugs.
“Do you think that coffee machine out there still works?” Sam asks, a little breathless, and Dean takes a moment to appreciate the broadness of Sam’s chest as it expands with the aftermath of his little brother’s exertion. Dean reaches inside his leather jacket and produces a silver thermos in one hand and an engraved flask in the other. He flourishes both with a triumphant grin.
“Well, if it doesn’t, I’ve got your favourite poison and mine right here. Hot and strong, just how you like it, Sammy.”
2015
The Daily Grind offices are buzzing when Nigel Walker arrives that morning. The Winchesters have agreed to an exclusive interview, and Nigel can’t believe his luck when the editor tells him he’s got the gig.
They call Sam Winchester the Boy King, though he’s in his thirties now. At his right hand is his older brother, Dean, and at his left is his personal assistant, Meg Masters, who some call his familiar. Never to her face, mind. It’s said people have seen her eyes turn black as coffee grounds when angered.
Sam Winchester rules the world from the Bean Belt, now known as the Demoncratic Roastpublic. Yeah, laugh it up. Apparently Dean Winchester thought it was a great name, and nobody was going risk telling him it wasn’t.
The Winchester Empire expanded into the continental United States for the first time in 2007, not long after they’d taken down the last Demon Cartels of South America. Nigel Walters is a sceptic. He thinks most of the tales about that confrontation is rumour and hype, part of the Winchesters’ very effective marketing strategy to keep rivals, both commercial and political, off balance and on edge.
Sam Winchester’s office is surprisingly stark, all light and space and minimalist furnishings, though the air is filled with a subtle aroma that speaks of expensive coffee blends. There are undertones of leather and, strangely, gun oil, but that doesn’t stop Nigel’s mouth watering in anticipation. His hands shake, even though he’s had his double expresso this morning.
The Boy King himself isn’t really rocking the cutthroat executive image Nigel’s seen in the glossy magazine spreads. Sam’s mouth is soft at the corners, twitching with a readiness to smile, and his eyes are kind. His brother, on the other hand, looks every bit as dangerous as his reputation, in spite of (or maybe because of) those A Lister movie star features.
There’s a rumour that Dean Winchester doesn’t drink coffee. Nigel had always thought it was a lie; I mean, what kind of freak doesn’t need that hit of caffeine every hour or so? Looking at the slightly manic glint in Dean’s green eyes, Nigel’s questioning himself now. Maybe coffee abstinence (the very thought of it made Nigel shudder) would explain some of the more extreme stories about Dean Winchester.
An hour later and Nigel is running to his car, the evidence of a scoop of a lifetime clutched in his sweaty hand, all thoughts of his next caffeine hit drowned in the surge of adrenaline that had washed over him when Sam Winchester had explained their plans for the future.
In the distance Nigel could see the coffee fields burning. It was like the end of the world.
twisted_tropes Dark Roast challenge.Beta'd by the adorable blindswandive ages ago, I've messed with it since. This is the first thing I've written for an age so forgive me.
Title: The Road to Hell is Paved with Coffee Beans (or Subverting Armageddon, one sip at a time)
Words: c1800
Warnings: I dunno. Poor execution of a fun AU idea? Gencesty.
Rating: Adult
Characters: Sam winchester, Dean Winchester, Meg the demon, Azazel
Summary: Sam wasn't fed demon blood, it was all coffee, all the way.
The Road to Hell is Paved with Coffee Beans (or Subverting Armageddon, one sip at a time)
2005
It was probably two, maybe three years before anyone notices that coffee had changed from the mildly addictive, almost universal drink of choice, to a can’t-live-without-it drug. By then it’s already too late. There are probably some lost tribes in the Amazon rain forests who are uncontaminated, and a handful of people in the developed world who’ve never acquired a taste for the delicious bitterness of the dark roast, but they are few and far between. Way too few to have any influence when Azazel finally springs his trap for the world and for Sam Winchester.
Azazel’s plan is a good one, but it isn’t without flaws. The world might have rolled over, belly up, but the Winchesters don’t get the memo.
There are three factors the Yellow Eyed Demon fails to factor in.
One - Sam Winchester might be an addict, but he is smarter than all his Stanford professors put together, and sharper than the legendary First Blade.
Two - Meg has Daddy issues that make the Winchesters look like the Bradys. When the opportunity arises to stick a wrench in Azazel’s grinder, she doesn’t hesitate. It helps that she loathes coffee. It’s Earl Grey all the way for the YED’s wayward daughter.
Three - Dean Winchester isn’t going to waste good money on coffee when there is whiskey available. No one would have thought being a functional alcoholic would turn out to be an advantage in this life, but sure enough, one addiction trumped the other.
Okay, maybe there are four factors – the fourth being that Dean and Sam Winchester together are an unstoppable force. After John Winchester’s death, Dean rebuilds the family’s vintage coffee machine and discovers the demonic component in the coffee. It isn’t long before he and Sam realise something. If you alter the compound just so, suddenly coffee isn’t Sam’s kryptonite. In fact it’s the opposite. Coffee makes Sam stronger.
Armed with Meg’s insider information, Dean’s special blend and the demon killing blade, the Winchester brothers make their way south, into the heart of Azazel’s dark roast – Colombia.
~0~0~0~
Dean flips the serrated blade with a practiced ease, catching it unerringly by the worn-smooth bone handle every time. He’s not even looking while he plays, his gaze instead fixed on the green and pink flowered sign above the coffee shop door ahead of them. His grin is all teeth.
“Look, Sammy,” he says, “they’ve got Boca Villa, your favourite.”
Sam moves to stand at Dean’s right shoulder, and Dean’s smile widens as he breathes in. Sam gives off a dry, ozone charge that makes Dean’s skin prickle, in an atavistic contrast to the humid heat of the Colombian rain forest that forms a thick curtain around the town. Granonegro might be an innocuous, podunk kind of place, but it’s the centre of Azazel’s operation, and Meg has promised the yellow-eyed schemer will be here, waiting for them.
Dean side-eyes Meg as she takes her place on his left. He doesn’t need to say anything. She knows well enough the demon-killing knife she gifted the Winchesters will find a home in her shrivelled black heart if she betrays them now. That’s if Sam doesn’t suck out what’s left of her soul first and incinerate it.
Dean half hopes she’ll try something. His dick twitches a little in his Jeans, imagining how her pale skin will light up when the knife slides in. She might be helping them, but she’s still a demon, and her daddy is responsible for killing their dad, so…
“Dean.”
Sam’s voice is low, a warning and a reminder both. And, focus, Dean. This ain’t the time or the place.
“Yeah, yeah,” Dean mutters. He’s long past fretting that Sam reads his mind these days with a frightening accuracy. It would be disturbing if it didn’t get Dean so fucking turned on.
When the Winchesters move, it’s in perfect synchronicity. Their shoulders bump as they stride to the coffee shop door. Dean pushes it open and enters first, his brother’s shield and sword.
The café is nothing like an arch villain’s lair. It’s not even very South American. Dean is disappointed. He’d been hoping for something a bit more Indiana Jones-espresso, and this? This is more like a Sheena Queen of the Jungle mochaccino with nut syrup and extra cream.
Large windows and a high ceiling make the room light and airy, while the pale green table cloths and matching green and pink gingham curtains for some reason make Dean think of Mr Rogers. The clientele are a mix of humans and demons, all addicts. Some are so far gone they don’t even glance up from their thousand-mile caffeine stares, lost in the depths of their aromatic cups. The only person who shows any interest in their presence is the barista, a buxom, curvy brunette for whom, under any other circumstances, Dean would have been happy to turn on the charm. Her beetle-black eyes are a bit of a turn-off, though, and her smile is a joyless rictus.
“Ah, Winchesters. The boss is expecting you.”
Meg huffs a laugh and Dean quirks an eyebrow. He doesn’t need to look to know Sam’s smile is more shark-like than any demon could manage. Dean bites his tongue on the Monty Python no one expects the Spanish Inquisition quote, but when Sam steps forward he sees Sam’s eyes crinkle in amusement, as if Dean had said it out loud.
“Somehow I doubt that he’s expecting this,” Sam says to the demon, and brushes her aside with a casual flick of his fingers.
Less than a minute later and the café is wrecked, demons strewn about like so much flotsam in the wake of a Sam-shaped hurricane, and most of the furnishings little more than gingham covered matchwood. Dean rolls his shoulders and grimaces as sweat trickles down his back, adding to the already sizable damp patch on the back of his shirt. Fucking Sam hasn’t even so much as wrinkled his expensive cream linen suit, which was not only impossible but totally unfair.
“A knock would have gotten my attention, Sam, no need to go to all this effort,” Azazel’s drawl, familiar and hated, floats on the bloody dust out of the darkness of the back room, and Sam follows the sound, striding through the doorway. Dean follows, because that’s what he does.
Sam stops just inside the room and Dean bumps shoulders to let Sam know he’s ready, whatever Sam wants. Whatever Sam needs, Dean’s always ready.
“There was no effort involved, believe me.” Sam replies to the demon, his voice giving nothing away.
Azazel rises to his feet, maybe intending to greet them, maybe monologue a bit, the way bad guys always want to.
Sam doesn’t wait to find out which, he just raises one large hand and Azazel starts to fritz like a faulty light bulb. God, but Dean gets all tingly when Sam takes control. Dean cocks his head and watches, fascinated and admiring, as the demon’s eyes flare topaz with fear.
Ah yes. There it is, the moment of realisation for Yellow Eyes. He’s spawned a monster, a dragon born out of flames and blood, and the monster’s name is Sam Fucking Winchester.
Azazel’s meat suit explodes and the room momentarily fills with fiery fragments that whirl about like beans in a blender. Dean blinks away the after-image that’s burnt on his retinas and looks around. The room is empty, save for a heavy pall of arabica-scented smoke, the drop-out, the junkie and the only demon on Team Winchester.
Dean breathes deep. “You smell that, Sammy? That’s the scent of justice.”
Sam shrugs.
“Do you think that coffee machine out there still works?” Sam asks, a little breathless, and Dean takes a moment to appreciate the broadness of Sam’s chest as it expands with the aftermath of his little brother’s exertion. Dean reaches inside his leather jacket and produces a silver thermos in one hand and an engraved flask in the other. He flourishes both with a triumphant grin.
“Well, if it doesn’t, I’ve got your favourite poison and mine right here. Hot and strong, just how you like it, Sammy.”
2015
The Daily Grind offices are buzzing when Nigel Walker arrives that morning. The Winchesters have agreed to an exclusive interview, and Nigel can’t believe his luck when the editor tells him he’s got the gig.
They call Sam Winchester the Boy King, though he’s in his thirties now. At his right hand is his older brother, Dean, and at his left is his personal assistant, Meg Masters, who some call his familiar. Never to her face, mind. It’s said people have seen her eyes turn black as coffee grounds when angered.
Sam Winchester rules the world from the Bean Belt, now known as the Demoncratic Roastpublic. Yeah, laugh it up. Apparently Dean Winchester thought it was a great name, and nobody was going risk telling him it wasn’t.
The Winchester Empire expanded into the continental United States for the first time in 2007, not long after they’d taken down the last Demon Cartels of South America. Nigel Walters is a sceptic. He thinks most of the tales about that confrontation is rumour and hype, part of the Winchesters’ very effective marketing strategy to keep rivals, both commercial and political, off balance and on edge.
Sam Winchester’s office is surprisingly stark, all light and space and minimalist furnishings, though the air is filled with a subtle aroma that speaks of expensive coffee blends. There are undertones of leather and, strangely, gun oil, but that doesn’t stop Nigel’s mouth watering in anticipation. His hands shake, even though he’s had his double expresso this morning.
The Boy King himself isn’t really rocking the cutthroat executive image Nigel’s seen in the glossy magazine spreads. Sam’s mouth is soft at the corners, twitching with a readiness to smile, and his eyes are kind. His brother, on the other hand, looks every bit as dangerous as his reputation, in spite of (or maybe because of) those A Lister movie star features.
There’s a rumour that Dean Winchester doesn’t drink coffee. Nigel had always thought it was a lie; I mean, what kind of freak doesn’t need that hit of caffeine every hour or so? Looking at the slightly manic glint in Dean’s green eyes, Nigel’s questioning himself now. Maybe coffee abstinence (the very thought of it made Nigel shudder) would explain some of the more extreme stories about Dean Winchester.
An hour later and Nigel is running to his car, the evidence of a scoop of a lifetime clutched in his sweaty hand, all thoughts of his next caffeine hit drowned in the surge of adrenaline that had washed over him when Sam Winchester had explained their plans for the future.
In the distance Nigel could see the coffee fields burning. It was like the end of the world.
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