THEN!
Nick is super kill-y, and kinda super loves it.
Michael is trapped inside Dean’s mind cage.
Billie delivers a bombshell in a slim tome.
NOW!
Nick is looking for Abraxis – the demon who killed his family – and gets his latest demon hostage to give up who killed him. And she’s in Hibbing, MN!
Dean is packing a duffel, snatching a few angel-related books too, and heads off for a visit with Momma Mary, who is staying at Sheriff Donna’s cabin, which is right near Hibbing! DUN.
Dean tells Sam that he wants to go see Mom solo, and gives his little brother a hug goodbye. Which gives Sam a case of the HUH’s, leading him to call Mom, giving her a head’s up that her eldest is acting weird.
Dean and Donna share burgers at the Hungry Beaver Burger Stop.(<— shtap!!) We get a quick update on the Wayward girls, and rehash the Doug issue.
Donna sees through Dean’s little charade, and let’s him know that she knows the deal. Dean leaves another loved one with Concern Face.
More hugs.
Dean arrives at the cabin, and hearing gunshots, heads out back, gun at the ready. Mom is just practicing her shooting, killing a bunch of pumpkins!! Take that, pumpkin latte season.
Mom and son hug once the guns are tucked away.
Dean’s a hugger now.
He convinces his mom to go get the ingredients for Winchester Surprize, a melange that she used to cook for him and John, B.S. (Before Sammy). I thought it was pretty rude of him to just show up and send her off to go grocery shopping (especially seeing it is stone cold nighttime by the time she returns), but Dean has some work to do, and he needs Momma far away.
Dean Building Something Montage, which is fantastic. A man who knows how to use metal working tools is super hot. As is the leather apron.
(Please excuse me for a moment, while I fan myself.)
ANYWAY
Joe, a grocery store employee, helps Mary put her groceries in the back of the truck. Jokes about crossword puzzles and whiskey are volleyed. Mary drives off.
Joe is stopped by Nick, who is driving a very sketchy van, and asks if he knows where Mary lives. Our boy Joe does the right thing, claiming he doesn’t know this Mary Winchester, and then promptly calls Donna.
Donna, being awesome, finds Nick, runs the plates, and pulls him over. HI’YA.
Donna would have had him, too, if he didn’t have some handcuff lock-picker on him. He bonks Donna on the head, and quite politely puts her back in her police cruiser before taking off to kidnap Mary.
MEANWHILE – back at the cabin, Mary returns, and Dean has made a nice table for them, and offers to help with the cooking. Mary finally get a case of Concern Face, and calls Sam, telling him that, Yeah, Dean is being weird.
Sam, already in a car and headed to the cabin, Uh-Huh’s his Mom when she tells him to wait. Normally, I’m all, listen to your mother, but it is quite lucky that Sam is hard-headed on this.
Dean tells Papa Winchester stories during dinner, and Mary and Dean both get all melancholy over all the lost time between everyone, and if Dean doesn’t burst into tears, maybe, just maybe, I do. 🙂
Once Dean is snoring on the couch, Mary sneaks out to the shed to try and see what Dean is up too. When she figures it out, she is horrified, but before she can storm back inside and talk to Dean about it, Nick pops out of the bushes. SURPRIZE.
Dean is awoken by a ringing phone. He fumbles around and realizes it’s Mom’s phone that is ringing. Seeing it’s Donna, he answers it. Donna is flustered, and apologizing, sending Dean out the house, looking for Ma. He rounds the corner, and runs into his “little” brother, Sammy, who Hell Yeah, shows up just in the nick of time.
Dean is pissed. No hugs for Sammy!
Dean blames all of this on Sam, and his need to try and fix Nick. Dean, as usual, is way harsh.
Nick scares the bejesus out of Mary, and gets her to take him to the storage locker where she has Abraxis locked in an Enochian puzzle box. He wants to release Abraxis, because he has some questions for that jerk!
Mary is all, Abraxis needs a vessel. You won’t do, and I gots me a new tattoo!
So Nick goes and grabs the poor security dude, ties him up in the middle of a devil’s trap, and releases Abraxis right into its intended target.
Abraxis is all I’m Evil! Now kill Mary, slow and bloody, and I’ll be happy to give you all the deets on killing your fam. *insert evil laugh here*
You can see a glimmer of regret in Nick’s face, right before he decides he’s gonna kill Mary. (Good job, Mark Pellegrino!!) Of course, Sam and Dean and Donna crash the party, just in the nick of time! Nick breaks the devil’s trap as a distraction.
Chaos ensues as Abraxis starts blabbing. Seems as though Lucifer told him to kill Nick’s family, because Lucy needed him, but he wasn’t special. He was just some rando that they picked out of the phone book. Nick realizes that it was all just dumb luck that his life was ruined, and even more confused and hurt, Nick realizes that Abraxis can kill him too! Nick stabs the demon in the heart, which, quite frankly, surprized me! Before Nick and his blood covered angel blade can do any damage in an attempt to escape, Donna shoots him in the leg! Then Mary punches his lights out!
YES. Excellent one-two punch, ladies!
Donna drags Nick off to her cruiser, and Sam tells him he’s sorry he didn’t know how to help him, but now all he wants is for him to burn. Sam, taking a page out of Dean’s Way Harsh book!
Mary pulls Dean to the side, and is all, I know what you’re doing, and this is a family matter. Tell Sammy, or I will!
Mary has really gotten her Mom-voice back, and I like it.
Dean brings Sam to the shed, and shows him his art project. A coffin for Dean and Michael, to contain the two of them for eternity, sitting on the bottom of the ocean.
Sam is PISSED. “So, you came out here to see Donna, to see Mom on some, some what? Some sick, secret farewell tour? You were gonna leave, and you weren’t even gonna tell me. Me. Do you realize how messed up that is, how unfair that is?”
*ME TEARING UP*
Dean says that Billie told him that was the one and only choice to save Earth. That Michael will escape, and will destroy everything. Sam implores Dean to not give in to fate, and to fight, but Dean is having none of it. He is going to do this, no matter what, and asks Sam to help him.
I’M NOT CRYING, YOU’RE CRYING.
After everything these two have been through, Sammy is feeling all the things. Offended. Heartbroken. Devastated. Resigned. And he has every right to have, and revel in this wave of emotion. Making plans like this, behind Sam’s back, is Old Skool Dean, and Sammy is def getting a little PTSD from it all. This last scene, and the one with Dean and Mary having dinner, were both excellent moments that give this show the emotional heft that this series is so good at, even after all these years.
GOOD JOB, SHOW.
NEXT! Castiel doesn’t like Dean’s plan, either!