August, 1945, Mt Fuji, Japan

The expanding ring of cloud rose above the land with surprising speed, growing larger as it ascended into the atmosphere. There had been little outcry, most of those who'd perished had been wiped out before they were aware of the danger.

"So now they have the power of God," Raphael leaned against the two-handed hilt of his sword, staring down at the flattened buildings and vegetation. "And we're supposed to guide these apes?"

Gabriel didn't answer, his eyes half-closed as he reached out through the waves of energy, solid and liquid and gaseous. He could feel their Father's attention, the stirrings of anger that were reflected in a shift in the tectonic plates beneath their feet.

"They have gone too far, I tell you," Raphael said as the mountain trembled.

They both felt it at once, a subtle but definite change in the planet, something removed, from beneath the ground and the seas and oceans, from the seams in the rock and bones of the continents and under the golden sands of the deserts.

Gabriel nodded slightly. "As predicted, my brother, He has removed fire from their world."

Raphael looked at the cold volcanic cone they stood on, his mouth opening to argue.

Catching the incipient protest, Gabriel smiled. "The oil. The source of the energy they burn and waste and cannot replace," he said, gesturing widely around them. "It's all gone and they will be busy thinking of something to use instead, possibly for the next few centuries."

Raphael scowled. "That's it?! That's all?"

"It will be enough, I think," the Angel of Death slid his sword back into the sheath at his hip. "After the last fifty years, they might think better of a period of peace."

"They are as ants, and they will come up with something equally destructive, left to their own devices!" Raphael said scathingly.

His brother looked at him, the black feathers of his wings shivering in the wind that soughed over them.

"You want to wipe them out, Rafe?"

"I want to have what we were promised, brother," Raphael said with a sigh.

"What Lucifer promised, you mean?" Gabriel asked shrewdly. "That was a dream, Raphael."

The pale silver eyes of the archangel turned to him. "It didn't have to be."

In the open air of the mountain, the rustling beat of wings could hardly be heard. Gabriel stared thoughtfully at the churned snow where his brother had stood, then lifted his head abruptly. It was not something he sensed that rang a clarion of alarms in him. It was something he could no longer sense.

He could no longer feel his Father.

1972, Sioux Falls, South Dakota

The angel touched the rocky outcropping with the staff and the stone split, releasing a cloud of noxious fumes, a sickly pale red light spilling out from the widening crack, creeping over the ground, the grasses and weeds shrivelling and burning as it touched them.

The smoke that slithered through the gap was darker, almost black, a thickening spiral that hesitated in front of the angel and slowly solidified, becoming bipedal, humanoid, and finally taking on the form of a man, features only roughly sketched in but the glowing yellow eyes distinct and flickering with a malicious amusement.

"It's been a long time," the demon said to the angel, head turning curiously from side to side as it surveyed the small clearing.

"It has, Azazel," the archangel replied, the staff gripped tightly in one hand. "Mankind has reached equilibrium again."

The demon grinned, mouth stretching wide. "Yeah, doesn't matter what you throw at them, they seem to get back to square one sooner or later."

"He has gone."

"I thought that might've been the case," Azazel said, the smile vanishing and the yellow eyes considering. "Haven't heard of a genuine miracle for a long time."

"There is only one way we will ever see Paradise now."

"You want to release the devil?" the demon asked, the innocent tone of his voice belied by the slight lift of one side of his mouth. He shook his head. "The Seals, we don't know how to break them. Lucifer said that it's in the bloodlines, and he can't see foresee the union it would take."

"We're working on that," the angel said repressively. "Can you speak to him, freely?"

Azazel shook his head. "No, I dream sometimes. That's all."

"There is a spell. It is exact and it will open the bars of the cage enough to hear him whisper through them."

"And what is he supposed to tell me?"

The archangel let out a pained exhale. "He's been down there for three thousand years, Azazel. I'm sure he's been able to come up with something to get himself free."

Azazel looked narrowly at the angel. "While you keep your hands clean and lily-white?"

"There is no percentage to revealing our plan before it is prudent to do so."

"What's the spell?"

"A sacrifice of innocence and piety."

"In this world?" Azazel asked. "Come on."

"You'll work it out, Azazel," the archangel said dryly. "That has always been your gift."

"What about the next step?"

"That will depend a little on what the Morning Star can come up with, but the keys to the first and the last Seals will be within our grasp. I will contact you in six months time. You must be ready to act."

"I'll be ready," the demon promised, licking his lips hungrily. He'd already thought of the ideal sacrificial location.

"Good."

"Wait a minute," Azazel said, his hand snapping out and closing around the arm of the angel. "How many up there are on our side?"

The angel looked down at the hand coldly. "Enough," he said. "Enough to bring us to the Apocalypse, and then it will be too late."

Azazel's fingers closed on air as the blackened grass crumbled and blew away with the downdraft of the wings. He didn't trust them, not one inch. But he was out, and he had a few plans of his own. Dissolving back into the formless smoke, he rose out of the tight valley and rode the winds through the darkening sky to the east, looking for what he needed.

December 30, 1983

The garage was a big building but it could barely contain the amount of things it held, scavenged and cobbled together, re-designed and re-worked to suit the world as it had become.

John Winchester eased himself out from under the vehicle. He was a big man, not overly tall but broad across the shoulders and deep through the chest, heavily muscled from a lifetime of physical labouring. Dark hair flopped over a high forehead as he sat up on the low-wheeled creeper and dark green eyes stared morosely at the second vehicle in front of him, squeezed in beside the one he was working on. Both needed refitting to take the steam engines that Mike had modified and he'd refined. Steam wasn't powerful enough to get the vehicles moving at anything like the speeds he dreamed of, but these were solid farm vehicles, they only needed to get the produce from the field to the town and any speed would do for that.

Wiping the soot from his face with an already-filthy handkerchief, he glanced back at the connections from the boiler to the turbine. The gaskets were the best they'd been able to make, hardened rubber from the infrequent shipments that came up from the deep South, cut with the Winchester-modified hydraulic press. It was powerful enough to cut iron, and it did a good job on the rubber, the gearing could be extended a little more to make it more powerful still. The rubber would deteriorate though. Perhaps he should be setting himself up in business as a gasket manufacturer, he thought sourly, instead of doing all the modifications to the vehicles from start to finish.

On the walls of shelving, parts and gears and sheets of metal and bolts and nuts and screws and springs spilled from wooden crates and barrels, from heavy cane baskets and sewn leather bags. Most of them gleamed in the dull, low-wattage light that flickered steadily, matched by the throb of the steam-engine at the back of the building. They'd been salvaged, cleaned and ground out and coated in vegetable oil to keep them at their best until they could be used. Nothing was thrown away, everything was difficult to find and difficult to make and waste of any kind was a societal sin.

Getting to his feet, he tapped the creeper back under the vehicle with the heel of his boot and walked around the engine bay to the driver's door. The engine was fed with coal, and it could carry enough to run for a little under twelve hours. They'd fooled around with all sorts of solid mass fuels over the last few years, but coal was the most reliable, still the easiest to get hold of, and lasted the longest. It just burned dirty, leaving a residue of soot over everything. He set the flue and checked that the gears were disengaged then walked back to the engine and closed the coal door, waiting for the embers to catch again and the heat to move to the boiler. After a few minutes, it did and the high stovepipe released a burst of steam that instantly mantled the garage in moisture.

Well, it was running, he thought with some satisfaction. Clarence would be happy about that, if not the bill when Mike handed it over. Closing the flue and opening the coal door, he let the engine throb itself to a halt and walked toward the wide, double-doors. He could get started on the second one in the morning.

"How'd she run?" Mike met him at the doors, drawn by the brief low roar of the engine. "Gasket holding?"

"Tight as a drum," John agreed with a shrug. "We lose a lot of the power through making it too small."

"Those were the specs," Mike said resignedly. "Old coot can't drive worth a damn and he's got to be able to get the damned thing into the market without demolishing half the other stalls."

"Just sayin'," John pointed out pacifically.

"I know."

Mike looked at the younger man's face as they turned off the lights and closed the doors together. John had been through the ringer in the last two months, there was no doubt of that. He didn't know what to do for the man other than keep him busy. But being busy wasn't enough.

"Kate's got supper ready, comin' up to the house?" he asked, glancing over his shoulder as he locked the massive iron padlock into place.

"I'll be in later," John said, turning away toward the smaller shed between the garage and the fence. "Got something I want to keep working on."

"What the hell you building in there, John?"

The younger man smiled, ducking his head. "See for yourself."

They walked down to the over-sized garage – or under-sized workshed, depending on your point of view – and John unlocked the doors, pushing them aside. He hit the light switch and four sets of caged bulbs flickered and steadied, the filaments brightening slowly. In the middle of the clean concrete floor, a khaki tarpaulin shrouded a low, wide shape. Mike stared as John picked up one end of the tarp and drew it back.

"That a car?" he asked, walking toward it.

It didn't look like a car, none he'd seen anyway. Low to the ground, the flattened and rakish panels were barely curved, and pressed into sharp creases where they came down over the engine to meet the polished brass grill, and bent over the wheel arches. The windshield was a smooth pane from side to side, tilted back, reducing the size of the roof, the corner pillars thin. Mike walked down the length, looking at the long, thick brass pipes that flowed out from under the car, along the side and flared outward before the rear wheels. The roof barely had a camber either, and the rear window was as wide and seemingly as unsupported as the front.

John laughed self-consciously. "A hybrid of a few."

Mike stopped at the side and peered into through the window, turning after a moment to lift his brow queryingly at John.

"Go ahead," John said, walking around to the other side and opening the passenger door.

Opening the driver's side door, Mike looked inside. The wide bench seats in the front and back were upholstered in a beige leather. Behind the steering wheel, a burled-grain timber dashboard sloped back slightly, dials and gauges dark and still for the moment, a lot more than he'd seen on any other vehicle. He slid into the low seat, ducking his head belatedly as it hit the frame.

"Seems kind of … cramped … in here," he muttered as his gaze moved slowly over the instruments.

John nodded. "It's a lot lower than the usual," he agreed. "Better airflow over the body at speed."

Mike glanced at him. "At speed? What the hell you talking about?"

"I'll show you, when it's ready," John hedged, his expression wary.

Looking back at the gauges on the dash, Mike wondered what the man had come up with. Most of the car manufacturers had been shut down after the war. The cars that had been built before were huge tanks, plenty of room to swing a cat or three, with monster in-line or V8 engines – gas-guzzling tanks, his father had said to him when he'd been a boy. That had all stopped when the wells and pumps and reserves had run dry.

In the cities, the very wealthy might have their own vehicles, custom-made, steam-driven. Coal-guzzling, he thought without a shred of humour. Mostly, the world had reverted to the four-legged producers of horsepower for their local needs and rail or ship for long-distance travel. His eyes ran over pressure gauges and revolution gauges, fuel and charge and – he blinked – a speedometer that was calibrated from zero to a hundred and twenty.

"Pop the hood, John," he said heavily, remembering to lower his head as he got out.

The click of the hood release was loud in the silence between them and Mike walked around to the front of the car as John lifted the almost flat metal sheet. Underneath, gleaming oilily in the wide bay, the V8's manifold and pipes, of polished brass and iron, filled the space completely.

"This thing won't run on steam," he grunted, the statement almost a question.

"No, it runs on alcohol," John agreed, grinning slightly as he saw Mike's expression.

"Ethanol?" Mike's gaze dropped to the engine. "So that's what you wanted Jerry's corn for?"

John nodded, going to the workbench and picking up a file. He turned back and handed it to Mike. "Found these in that old Ford we picked up for spares."

The top clipping was a spec sheet for a Model T, built in 1909. He ran his gaze down the sheet, looking at the fuel types for the engine.

John nodded as he saw his expression. "I modified the carby, the timing and the ignition. The ignition is a trembler coil, same the T's. Works better than the magneto when the weather's cold. Alcohol's fussy about it."

"They couldn't make it work smoothly enough to keep the engines they had running," Mike said, shaking his head. "Didn't go back this far, of course, but still – how'd you get it going?"

"Well, it's not all the way there yet," John said, gesturing at the car. "Haven't figured out the best mile per gallon yet, and I'm still finessing the injections. She cuts out on corners sometimes."

"You've driven it?" Mike's brows shot up. "Can I – damn, start her up!"

John shook his head. "Not tonight, got the distributor in pieces," he said, a little regretfully. "Tomorrow."

Chewing on the side of his lip, Mike stepped back and looked at the rest of the car again. "You going into automobile manufacturing?"

"No. Just a one-off."

He turned to John, wanting to ask why and the answer occurred to him as he looked at the younger man. There was nothing John could do about the fire that had taken Mary and destroyed their home, their family. The police and the fire department hadn't offered any explanations and John's version of the events of that night were garbled and nonsensical. He had no doubts that the experience had unhinged the man to some extent, although it wasn't showing much. Turning to what he did know, what he could do … it was a reasonable course of action for a man who served with distinction in the National Militia.

"Boys'll wanna see you, don't be too long," he reminded John now. "And I'm holding to you that promise about tomorrow!"

"I won't be long."

Watching him leave, John let out a soft exhale and turned to the car. Working on it had given him a purpose, when he'd been floundering and struggling. The idea of using the old and the very old in a new way had come at the right time. But it wasn't all that he was doing out here. He lowered the hood, hearing the lock catch, and looked at the filing cabinet that was almost hidden behind the racks of spare parts and sheet metal panels, walking slowly over to it. The top drawer held the smaller parts he'd scrounged for the car. The bottom drawer held books and files on the other things he'd been looking for. Reaching into it, he drew out the book that lay on the top. A World History of the Supernatural, the title read, in faded gold leaf against the cracked black leather cover.

He walked around the car, opening the driver's door and sliding inside. The overheads gave him enough light to read in there and a part of him felt as if the fanciful concoction he'd created was a part of this journey now, a partner and friend in discovering what had really happened on the night of November 2nd.

The book fell open to the section he'd been reading and he stared at the fine ink drawing on the right-hand side, not seeing it, seeing something else, something much more terrifying. She'd been on the ceiling. No one believed him. The fire had burst out around her like a living thing. No one believed that either. There were no rational, logical explanations for what he'd seen, what he'd felt in that room in the moments he'd looked down at his youngest son and seen the drop of blood fall onto his hand.

His chest tightened as the memory replayed in his mind's eye. A pungent stink of sulphur. The droplet, dark red against his skin, against Sammy's pillow, in the dimness of the nursery's nightlight. And Mary's face, drawn in agony as she'd stared down at him.

Help. He needed help, Kate had said, when he'd told her and Mike about what he'd seen. He did, that was true. But not the sort she was alluding to. He needed help to find out what happened that night. It had not been an overload of a traumatised mind.