I keep thinking about how well grantaire and anna would get along (before she gets re-brainwashed)... i know you've moved away from spn canon with UMW but do you have thoughts on how your characters would theoretically interact with spn characters?
ah yes, the re-brainwashing was very unfortunate 😔
my main headcanon re. UMW characters meeting SPN characters is that if Enjolras and Grantaire met Sam and Dean, based on Enjolras's personality and him having the sword, they would absolutely assume he was the angel of the pair 😂 Dean would probably commiserate with Grantaire about the challenges of hanging out with a socially challenged angel, and Grantaire would absolutely go along with it. Then Cas would show up and be like 'hello brother 😐' and spoil his fun.
I think Enjolras and Dean would butt heads, but Sam and Combeferre would probably get along quite well. I hope the spirit of Victor Hugo can't see me typing this.
Ages ago I actually started writing a little crossover story just for fun but I found it really weird 😂 I don't know if I'll ever write any more of it so I'll put what I have under a cut here if anyone wants to read it lol
(it is definitely not UMW canon 😂)
Grantaire is in a long-abandoned barn in rural Belgium, idly sweeping up the ashy remains of the shapeshifter that had been terrorising the nearby village in the guise of a local cryptid legend, when Combeferre pops into his mind with a bemusing prayer:
Don't come back to my apartment right now.
Grantaire pauses, awaiting further details. If Combeferre were in danger, he's sure he wouldn't bother beating around the bush, so Grantaire isn't overly worried, but Combeferre has never told him to stay away before and so he waits, curious. A minute or so later, an even more bemusing continuation:
Or if you do, make sure you come in through the front door like a human would.
Sometimes Grantaire desperately wishes that the prayer communication line went both ways. Combeferre feels distracted, like there are many other things demanding his attention and he is snatching at quiet moments to send Grantaire fragmented intel. Finally:
Other hunters here.
With that, the pieces slot together. Grantaire personally thinks it would be kind of funny for him to drop in on a room full of Musain hunters, especially the ones who'd written him off as a drunken waste of space years ago, and he could always erase their memories after if it was going to cause problems, but he supposes that Combeferre's solution of just keeping him away for a while is simpler. He finishes his clean up and is just about to return to Jehan's house when Combeferre reaches out again.
Could use your expertise for this. Come back if you're able? But please be discreet.
Grantaire snorts. He thinks he'll enjoy having a conversation with Combeferre later about why it's okay to pretend that he's human to other hunters, but not to Enjolras or Combeferre himself. He's well aware of the difference and the reasoning, of course, but he does like watching Combeferre wrestle with a moral quandary.
Enjolras is here, too.
This last part sounds like a warning, and Grantaire supposes it is, and one he should be thankful for. He braces himself before flying back to Combeferre's building, going up the stairs with pointed emphasis and hoping everyone in the apartment can hear his very normal, very human footsteps approaching. He opens the apartment door, calling out a greeting, and he steps inside and the world stops.
The other angel in Combeferre's living room stares at him, his human face registering only mild surprise even as his luminous true form roils and sparks in shock and alarm and, of course, horrifyingly, recognition. Grantaire stares back for a wild, world-tilting moment, and then he flies in a mad flurry, grabbing Enjolras and Combeferre and taking them to the furthest side of the room, pushing them behind him. Combeferre, who had just expressly told Grantaire to be on his best and most human behaviour, calls his name in confused dismay, and Enjolras is saying something too, demanding to know what he's doing, and there are two other humans here too, making their own noise, but then—
"Hello, brother," Castiel says, and all the humans in the room fall deathly silent.
Grantaire doesn't answer. His hand instinctively twitches to curl around the handle of a blade not currently in his possession. He can feel the presence of his sword burning in Enjolras's coat pocket and he wonders if the split second it would take for him to get to it will mean fiery death for all of them.
Three thousand years, he thinks. Three thousand years he successfully kept his head down, and then Combeferre goes and invites another angel into his living room—!
"Aw no, brother?" one of the new humans repeats. Grantaire doesn't dare take his eyes off Castiel, but the human sounds exasperated. He also sounds American, which raises many questions but also answers the one of why they are all here and not at the Musain. Grantaire can only imagine the Musain hunters' reaction to Americans descending upon their home base. "Cas, are you serious?"
"He's pretty clearly serious." The other human puts himself in Grantaire's line of vision, stepping between him and Castiel with one hand raised placatingly. He's uncommonly tall and more than broad enough in the shoulders to be considered physically imposing by human standards, but his posture and expression are currently extremely non-confrontational—he looks nervous, and sort of concerned. He looks at Grantaire first but then, clearly finding no invitation in his stony face, tilts his head to look past him at Enjolras and Combeferre instead. "So, uh. Got yourselves an angel."
"As do you, it would seem," Combeferre says with measured calm. It's strange to hear him speak English. Out of the corner of his eye, Grantaire sees him take half a step forward and hisses back at him, "Don't."
"Hey, who are you? Do we know you?" the first human says suddenly. "Are you an old douchebag in a new meat-suit?"
"Dean," Castiel says in quiet admonishment.
"What? It's not like we can tell."
"You don't know him," Castiel tells him before turning back to Grantaire. "This isn't necessary. I'm not going to harm you or these humans. You should calm yourself."
"And if you want to harm Cas then we're going to have a problem," the tall human says.
Grantaire makes no attempt to calm himself. "Are you alone?" he demands of Castiel, whose vessel affects a faintly puzzled expression.
"I'm here with Sam and Dean," he says slowly, and Grantaire scowls.
"I mean," he says, "where is your garrison?"
"I no longer serve Heaven, Rachmiel," Castiel says in oddly gentle tones, as if he's just realised why Grantaire would be so horrified to see him.
"Do not call me that," Grantaire snaps with a sharp shake of his head. "You—what do you mean?"
"I am...fallen." There's a strange mixture of pride and shame in Castiel's voice as he says it. "My loyalties were tested and I found them to lie more with humanity than with our brothers and sisters."
"You…" Grantaire's mind, emerging from the initial shock, starts to piece things together, starts to remember. "I saw you. Last year. You were killing angels and humans. Hundreds of them."
"Hey, that wasn't Cas," one of the humans, Dean, starts to protest, while Grantaire hears twin sharp intakes of breath from Combeferre and Enjolras as they apparently make the connection between the God-Monster they'd seen on screen all those months ago and the mild-mannered man standing before them now.
"Look, okay, let's...We didn't come here to fight," says the other human, whom Grantaire assumes, through elimination, to be Sam. "It's complicated, okay? But Castiel is with us. He's not the bad guy. He's saved our lives more times than I can count and—hell, he helped us stop the apocalypse."
"Did he say the apocalypse?" Grantaire hears Enjolras mutter behind him.
"What did you two have to do with the…?" Grantaire looks at the two strangers properly for the first time and feels a fresh wave of hysteria. There is a lot to be read from their souls that he will unpack later, but most pressingly, he can see who they are—what they are. "You're the vessels." His undoubtedly wild-eyed gaze swings back to Castiel. "You're walking around with Michael and Lucifer's vessels? You brought them here?"
"Michael and Lucifer are both in the cage," Castiel says. "I do not expect they will be coming looking for their vessels."
"And they already know that they do not have consent to take either of us for a ride," Dean says with a grimly sardonic smile.
Grantaire's head feels like it's going to explode, which wouldn't kill him but would undoubtedly be very distressing for Enjolras and Combeferre to witness. He wills his vessel to hold it together.
"Grantaire," Combeferre says quietly—even that makes him jump. Combeferre speaks to him in soft, rapid-fire French that the Americans clearly do not understand and that Castiel politely pretends not to hear. "If he's really broken with Heaven, isn't that a good thing? For you to not be the only one?"
Grantaire casts a somewhat tortured glance back at him, not anywhere near ready to accept the idea that running into anyone from his family could ever be good, before looking inevitably back to Castiel, unable to keep his eyes from returning to the perceived threat in the room.
"It is good to see you," Castiel says, horribly earnest. "I believed you dead."
"Yeah, that was the idea," Grantaire snaps. Castiel tilts his head to one side like a confused puppy, a crease appearing between his eyebrows.
"You've been in hiding," he hazards finally.
"Pretty successfully, up until now," Grantaire says.
"Hey, just like Gabriel," Dean remarks. "You gotta wonder how many other angels flew the coop."
"Gabriel," Combeferre repeats in tones of disbelief that match Grantaire's own feelings. "The archangel? He also…?"
"Gabriel is dead," Grantaire says bluntly.
"Yeah, but he had a good run hanging out down here pretending to be a trickster god," Dean says with a smile that suggests not-so-fond remembrance. "What've you been hiding out as? Some other deity?"
There's an agonising sort of pause, and then it's Enjolras who says, not without bitterness, "A human."
Dean whistles. "That's a bold choice."
"Rachmiel," Castiel says, and Grantaire wants to scream. "Heaven will not hear of any of this from me. You and your humans are safe. Please. I—Here."
He puts one hand up as if in surrender while his blade falls from the sleeve of his coat into his other hand. He holds it up, slowly and demonstratively, before setting it down on Combeferre's coffee table and stepping back.
There is a very strange, very awkward moment where Castiel and his two humans look at Grantaire expectantly, waiting for him to return the gesture and disarm. Finally, Enjolras steps forward. He catches Grantaire's eye questioningly and, at his nod, takes Grantaire's blade out of his own coat and lays it next to Castiel's. Dean and Sam's eyebrows shoot up and Castiel gives a slow, considered blink, but mercifully all three of them refrain from saying anything about the matter.