Chapter 1-The Beginning
She closed the door of her sisters' car and slowly turned around, looking at the houses and the street unconsciously surveying, as if brand new to her again. She watched for anything different, but turned to stare at her sisters' apartment. "When did they take down the tree?"
Her sister's feet stopped next to her, a beep came from the car "You haven't been here in over two years and you go for the tree missing!"
"And your acting surprised." Her sister's eyes shifted to the ground and then back up at her smiling with her deep blue eyes. She realized, a feeling, that came through her as she looked at her sister again, with an even more surprised look, then that on her sisters face, "Jess, really?!"
Jess began to walk to the campus apartment complex in a hurry and her sister followed adjusting her duffle bag on her shoulder.
"You're going to marry this guy…"
"Sam."
"Sam and you haven't told him!" She paused for a second. "Seriously, he hardly knows you have a sister. Really?!"
Jess walked through the door of the apartment building and up the stairs. She continued in not speaking to her sister, knowing full well words out of her mouth, need not apply.
Her sister stopped at the door with her, questioningly looking at her, "Why the hell would his brother come at night to pick him up to look for their father?"
They walked in.
"Ok, the brother sounds like a typical male. You know you could have taken him down for looking at your smurfs," she grinned and dumped her bag on the couch. "Green tea, please," as she watched Jess walk into the kitchen.
She began to walk around the apartment, looking and tracing her eyes over everything. Jess had changed a lot of things since this guy had moved in, at least in her opinion. Furniture was the same; everything still looked like it belonged to Jess though. Her touch was everywhere, but you could see someone else lived there, that a man lived there, somewhere. She began to look for something, moving her head back and forth in front of the walls and cabinets, her hazel eyes scanning for the thing she was most interested in.
"What are you doing?"
"Ransacking for pictures, of course," she paused in front of a white wall. Placed lovingly; hanging, was a picture of them; his brown, skater hair, and big grinning smile wrapped with arms around her sister. The picture of perfection, she smiled, "I can't believe you're finally at this stage."
Her sister stopped next to her again, she grinned, knowing exactly what her sister meant. "I figured it was time he saw you. Maybe now I can put a picture of you somewhere…"
"Instead of hidden in that, The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail book, hidden in between the bigger books on that bookshelf," she finished and pointed to the bookshelf a couple of steps away. The small book was captured in between the center of the huge law degree books, unnoticed to the trained eye.
Jess's eyes looked down, "You know I have to, Faith," she paused and looked at her sister intently. "Why did you cut your hair?"
A smile spread across her face, "Two inches, you may still have it."
They sat down on the couch, silent, steady as they drank their teas. Faith looked around checking everything. Every nook, every door, seeing in her mind the lay out she pictured perfectly, noticing everything that had changed in every inch of the apartment. She came back and looked at Jess, her eyes sympathetic. "I don't think he's distaining himself from you. I can see him, can't read him, but you still have him wrapped around your finger. Don't worry." She smiled.
"It just seems like for a week, he's been somewhere else, trying to act like he always does…."
"But failing, I see him. Any other girlfriend would have never noticed, but I can see what you mean," Faith stopped for a minute; she seemed to drift away, something caught her attention in her mind.
Jess looked from the fireplace to Faith, sensing something was wrong, "Faith?!" her voice worried & steady, as if stepping into old patterns.
Faiths' eyes looked steadily ahead, not breaking, and then she blinked.
Jess's eyes looked at her more intently, "Is it Sam?"
Faith still didn't move, but her eyes bore into Jess, as if trying to figure something out. "It's weird," she stopped. Jess's eyes looked more worried and questioning, her hand fell to Faiths' arm as if she was trying to steady Faith, though Faith was steady even more now. "I really can't read Sam at all."
Jess moved her arm away, surprise crossed her face, and her voice became unsatisfied and unreadable. Moving her blond wavy hair behind her back with her slim hand, she said, "You've never had any issues reading someone through another person before."
Faith looked at Jess with a defeated and irritated look, her mind was still busy thinking, but changed the subject as she pulled herself and Jess off the couch, "Maybe, when he gets back. Food starvation could be the issue."
Her eyes looked away from Jess, they flashed pure green throughout the entirety of her eyes, and then they were normal as she pulled Jess to the kitchen.
"Homemade juicy burgers, ahh always the way to go. Seriously!"
Jess's big smile brimmed across her face; her head bent down cleaning the table watching her sister eat; what could have truly been a pound of beef and a pound of cheese, squeezed together with lettuce, tomatoes, and pickles in between two pieces of burger bread, was being chewed by her meat loving sister. "Sam, never eats like you do."
Faith looked up, astounded, "But he's a guy!"
"I know, but he doesn't. He'll eat any good burger, but not in the amount you do," Jess paused. "I did catch him one time talk about his brother under his breath and how he had eaten four pounds of beef in a burger; along with fries, a half a pie, and some cookies."
Faith stopped eating and looked at her sister, but then continued eating, "Ha! Mmm!"
"What?"
"Mmm! Nothing. So, when is your Sammykins coming home?"
Jess stopped and looked at Faith; she questioned her as if Faith should know the answer to that. She slowly said, "I don't know. I thought you could decipher that for me." Jess slowly cleaned the dishes in the sink, her head looking down, sadness and hope mixed within her face.
Faith could read within Jess's white transparent face that Jess felt uneasy with something, that she felt something was wrong with tonight. That something would happen, but she had no idea what. Faith felt along within Jess finding the fear within her that she was afraid that it was about Sam and the sudden departure with his older brother.
Faith stopped eating and looked at her burger in front of her held in between both of her hands. She focused, a feeling ebbed through her, not too different then Jess's. It was something that told her to leave, that both of them should leave now. Faith's eyes looked up at Jess's back as she moved around the kitchen, overly cleaning everything, out of habit of disappearing. Now she was determined to figure out this Sam Winchester. She whipped her curly, wavy red hair out of her face with her slightly thin hand, like she always had from years of wearing it down and determinedly focused on what she wanted to see.
She focused on his face that she had seen in the picture and in Jess's mind. His tall figure compared to her sisters'. His athletic figure formed and shaped from years of endurance or maybe just luck in the genetic department. 'Focus,' she thought to herself. She saw his hazel eyes, focused on seeing through them. She waited, she breathed, even and steady breaths. Minutes passed by, nothing. She tried harder, and then even harder, her head started to shake. Her eyes glazed over in pure green color, pupils gone, white all but disappeared. She saw something another man, shorter then Sam, hazel eyes too. Her body began to join her head in the shaking, she heard him talk to the shorter man
"…You gotta update your cassette tape collection." She saw him through his own eyes, take the cassette tapes out. The sight of gas pumps nearby with the look of empty desertion all around.
"Why?" she heard the other man ask.
And Sam continued "One they're cassette tapes and two Black Sabbath, Motorhead, Metallica. It's the greatest hits of Mullet Rock!"
"House Rules Sammy! Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cakehole."
Then she gasped, her eyes closed, in that second of darkness from her own eyelids, she saw the disgusting color of yellow. One pair of two eyes with flowing disgusting yellow in them and then gone as Jess shook her, yelling her name. "FAITH!"
She opened her eyes, she looked forward, then at Jess, horrified at what she saw. The yellow eyes looked familiar, like she had looked into them before. "FAITH!" She came to the second time her name was yelled. She looked at Jess, fear possessing every inch of her sister's eyes. "I'm fine!" she blurted out. "He's fine!"
"Yea, right, 'fine'! Faith, you're bleeding through your nose. You haven't bled through your nose since you were thirteen." She took Faiths' shoulders within both of her hands and held her tight. Looking into her eyes, she searched for the truth within Faith, the reason.
Faith breathed in and released, she focused on calming her sister down, hearing the worried thoughts of Jess run through both of their brains. She looked into Jess's eyes; hers back to normal now, and said with a steady and confident breath, "Jess, I am fine. For some reason it's harder to read Sam. I can get through into him, but it causes this," she stopped and wiped the blood flowing from both of nostrils on to her sleeve. "I swear I'm fine now and so is Sam. I saw through his eyes. He was talking to his brother about Mullet rock."
She stopped talking anymore to Jess, dared not tell her of the yellow eyes she saw, but refused to show her fear in her face. Giving Jess her best acting face she'd been taught to have. Jess looked more intently trying to see passed the façade; it didn't work, falling for Faiths half explanation. "Sam is ok?"
"Yes, telling his brother to update to CD's."
Jess smiled and moved away slightly as she started to pick up the dropped burger in Faiths' lap. "Here, go clean up."
Faith moved the chair back, steadying herself through the palms of her hands on the table. She moved away from Jess out the kitchen door and to the bathroom. Grabbing her duffle as she passed the couch and shuffled to the door of the bathroom, she paused and breathed through the door, leaned against the doorframe, and locked the door. She moved to the mirror and looked at her face, the stains of blood still softly showed against the dips underneath her nose.
Turning the water on, she washed her face, cleaning the rest of the blood. She felt fear again run through her veins, this time they were most definitely her own. She looked at her stained arm sleeve and then into the mirror again. Jess's instinct was right, something was going to happen to them tonight, and she knew Jess would never leave knowing that Sam could return home any second.
"Azazel"
Faith jumped, looked around her, looked for the voice that had said that name. She stopped, realizing nothing was there. She grabbed the sides of the sink, her head bowed down. Words rushed through her head, years of training came at her. What mattered though was the voice, had it been in her head or was there really something, already there.
Faith waited in the bed, lying next to Jess, like they had done when they were little. Faith had thought it safer together, she had pretended to fall asleep, and letting Jess get the rest she needed.
For once the lights had been turned off; Faith had adjusted to the night, watching for anything to change, any sudden noise, and any sudden smell. She let herself only slightly slip now then, feeling Jess's breathing against the bed. She remembered the times when they were younger. Always being woken up in the middle of the night, both of them together, told to change as they crept down their boarding schools ancient steps. Down to the deepest parts of the school, where to them, they had only known, the two of them were allowed. Being brought there since they were the ages of six and five; since that point taught martial arts, the skills of a hunter, deeper knowledge of ancient teachings that were not even taught to the other kids of their special ancient society school, outside the realm of the average boarding school. Shown the ways to handle guns, knives, and taught to track not just the "average" way, but the "supernatural" way. They were made to memorize whatever was laid before them. They knew things that even the best archeologist, doctors, scientists, Navy Seals, and the best of the best didn't even know.
And Faith was taught even more, taught to handle the gifts that pushed her every day. Taught to handle her powers that the society said she must learn to control must learn to use, for the time when she would have to rise up. Faith recalled even remembering hearing herself being called The One. That whenever demons were spoken of this word was always spoken of and about finding the other one like her, her male counterpart. She to this day didn't think much of it and thinking about it now, didn't think they had probably even found that man. Otherwise, she thought he might have been there with Jess and her being trained like soldiers.
She focused again listening to anything, but when her eyes drifted to the clock, she saw the red digital numbers tell her its time. She pulled the pillow over her head and decided that maybe they were being to precautious, giving it up to much of the obsessive twenty years of training, as she checked once more, and drifted off to sleep.
"Faith," Jess whispered once in her sister's ear.
Faith eyes opened reacting to sound as she groaned realizing who it was. She looked at the clock near her head, two pm. "One more hour, please!"
Jess laughed and pushed against her body. "If you sleep to much you might miss Sam."
Faith looked up at Jess just slightly annoyed at Sam and sad for Jess; "As feelings go…" she stopped. Jess's eyes fell.
"No Sam."
"No apparently their not done looking for John."
Jess's head bolted up, "Was I thinking about his father?"
Faith looked at her, "Um, maybe or I heard it in Sam's head." She turned around in the bed, she paused for a minute. "Question," she didn't wait for Jess to think. "Whose side of the bed am I on?"
Faith jumped off the bed, "Ah! Why did you have to go and think that?! Really, now I can't sleep."
Jess turned around and laughed in amusement, "I know."
"Uh! Ew!" She rubbed the imaginary gross thoughts off of her. "Soap, the best, mind erasing soap you can find. That's what I need." She walked out.
"Ok, seriously, when have we ever shopped this much in our lives," Faith dumped the bags on the couch and shook her wrists, rubbing the red marks away.
"Hey, miss hippie-bohemian chic woman. Who's the woman that wanted to stop for clothes, at every store!"
"Well, who was the one that was in the stores with me! Grabbing at everything you saw." Faith wrapped her arms around her sister's neck and hugged her as Jess put her bags next to Faiths, but decided against it.
Reading Jess's mind Faith grabbed her bags off the couch and started lugging them to the spare room, where she'd put her duffle bag. She looked at her watch as the bags landed on the floor. She knew Jess was getting into her p.j's, so she grabbed her own out of the duffle, and started to change. Before she pulled her shirt off she looked at her watch again to make sure, a little past midnight ticked away, as she pulled it off. Shopping in a mall, eating dinner and a double movie had shot the rest of the day and night. She felt her necklace thud lightly against her chest as she looked at it. The tiny ring hung from the metal chain, she looked at, her hands on her jean button. She shied; she needed to talk to Jess, sometime soon, before Sam got back. Whatever the hell he was up to, she had not a clue, she didn't want to attempt to read his mind again. Whatever prevented her from easily reading him, made her bleed, she didn't want to test those waters again. She'd tried to trigger a premonition on him, didn't work, tried to read his brother through him, couldn't. She had the urge to kick him, she suppressed it.
She quickly removed her pants and jumped into her pj bottoms, pushing the necklace and ring under her shirt.
"Hey, wanna chat a little?" she said landing on Jess's bed, this time on Jess's side.
"Not tired?"
"Mm, a little. I just wanted to talk to you about something I didn't bring up before, you know with all that shopping!" she grinned at her. Jess sat down on the other side of the bed and got comfortable with Faith. "It's about Seth."
"Did you two break up?"
"No, um," Faith looked down at her neck, feeling the weight of the necklace around her chest. "What do you think of him?" She could feel Jess think about what to say, about what should come out of her mouth, and nothing Jess was worried about Faith over hearing.
"You know what I think," she smiled. "What do you think?"
Faith stopped for a minute, "I don't know, well I do, Seth is great. I mean he graduated top of his class at Harvard, come on!"
'So,' she abruptly heard Jess think.
"He'll have a great job, when he's done with his residency. He loves kids," she paused for a minute. "And me."
"Do you love him?"
Faith thought of how she should say this, she didn't doubt she loved Seth, otherwise why would she have said, "Yes."
"Then what's wrong?"
"Um, a lot of things have changed since you last saw him. Not in too much of a bad way, well depending on your frame of mind," she stopped for a minute. "Oh, I didn't tell you….." she paused for another minute.
"Is something going on with you and Seth? You know you can tell me anything, you're my sister," Jess's eyes and thoughts filled with concern.
Faith stopped and looked into Jess's eyes, she became frustrated and sad that she was starting to make Jess think Seth was doing bad things. "Je…never mind. We can talk about it later. I am actually really tired now." She moved up and around the bed walking to the door.
"Hey," Jess said, stopping Faith in her tracks. Jess walked over to her and wrapped her arms around her sister. She felt Jess's head lie next to her own and Jess's arms squeeze her tight. Faith smiled and hugged her sister back. They stood there for a few minutes, just holding each other in their arms.
A memory flashed in Faith's mind, back when they were 7 and 6. When Faith got scared from the constant pushing from what she called her psychic teachers. She was being pushed and pushed everyday and every night to control and further her powers. Faith endured so many noise bleeds with so much loose of blood that the headaches were getting worse as well. Just this hug reminded her of every night they climbed those steps back up to their conjoined rooms in the southern tower of the school, where Jess would grab her and hug tight. Where Jess would find a tissue and wet it, to rub away the blood that fell from her nose and past her lips. It was soon enough though that the bleeding stopped and the headaches ceased by the time she was thirteen. After then, she still got the hugs when she needed them.
Jess pulled away and smiled, 'Sleep!'
'Faith'
Her eyes opened and she looked around the room. The room was dark and her eyes adjusted to the difference. She tried to distinguish the things in the room and everything looked the same. She listened again, but the voice didn't come. She listened for Jess's thoughts, nothing.
She pulled back the covers, jumped out of bed, Jess always had thoughts. Never had she ever lost a thought in sleep. The only thoughts Faith never heard from Jess were when she was miles away, towns away, states away.
Faith moved across the floor, her body came into the moonlight that shined through her room. The strength of the moon was strong casting its waxing shades from being full two nights ago. Faith's hand reached for the door and as it creaked open, the whiff came through the door; the smell of sulfur pierced her nose. 'Ug,' she thought, but she moved, following the smell. Sliding along the wall, flat against it, moving slowly, listening to anything that sounded different. She focused on Jess; she still couldn't hear a thing from her. She put her hand to her heart and tried to listen to a heartbeat that sounded like Jess's, nothing. She became scared, her thoughts tried to focus on her training.
The smell of sulfur could really only mean one thing, though this one was distinct, but not unknown to her, she knew that. She stood near Jess's door and looked through the crake and slowly pushed it open. She listened for anything's thoughts now, wishing to hear something. She paid attention to any sound a body would make, the breathing of the lungs, the beat of a heart, the moving of food, if she had to. Nothing came though, she moved in closer inside the room. Something felt off, nothing was right; she walked in closer, more so into the room. It was so quiet, not a sound of anything. She looked both ways and felted for the light, flicked it on. She looked into Jess's bed, nothing.
Then, the lights flickered, and burned out. The hair on the back of her neck stood up, her instinct flared and as she moved in more, she left the entrance of the door. She stopped where she was and then, then door slammed. She jumped and turned around.
A man stood by the door, his arm stretched across its frame. He stood erect in a long brown coat and looked at his hand flat on the door. Then his head turned up, a thin grin flashed across his face, neither lip parted, caught in attention to what they were told to do. "My little Faith, how long I have waited for you, your sister, your family to let me have you." He slowly moved towards her, slow and thought filled steps. He moved closer to her, slowly pushing her with his advances.
"You do not know how long I have set my goal on attaining you. To have you join me in my little army," he stopped to shimmer in his thoughts. "Well, when I am done, it shall be larger then I first intended in the beginning, but we do what we can."
Faith looked into his eyes, she closed hers and there they were those yellow eyes she had seen before. She opened hers again, they were the same ones, and she stopped moving. "Azazel!"
"Oh, you remember me, I see. Well, you are more advanced than the others. I must remember to thank your coven, or secret society, whichever they choose to be called. They have done me a great service preparing you for me. Forcing you to hunt, to advance you powers, mmm, I owe them much," he stopped his advancing and leaned a finger on the bottom of her chin, tracing along her smooth skin. Then her eyes flashed yellow, she saw it but for a moment as it happened. Azazel was elated, "Perfect. You will have to do me a favor once you've come over. It has something to do with another One, but we'll save that for later. For now, I will be generous."
Faith peered within his eyes, he stood there staring intently back at hers. "You read my mind, my little Faith!" He stopped and smiled, "How does that go?"
She looked at him and focused, "Mom!" Her eyes widened as his responded, he was taken back at this, Azazel wasn't prepared for this.
"How?" he tried to close his mind, his hand dropped.
Faith saw when she was six months old; saw herself staring up out of the crib, her beautiful baby mobile swung around. Then she saw his eyes those disgusting yellow eyes, she saw him stare back at her, and then his arm moved above her mouth. She felt the cold piercing touch of something cool, she reacted and her tongue moved out. She felt herself taste it now; she looked more at Azazel in her present way. "Blood," she spoke.
Then as a baby again, she saw his face turn towards her door, she smelled her mother's smell, lavender and berries. She heard a scream and then she felt it done; she looked away from Azazel's face and looked up. She felt herself become aware of something cold, the coldest touch she had ever felt on her hand. She squeezed it and looked, it was his, she felt his face turn and look back at her. Her face peered back at his; she saw his grin planted on his face.
"Elizabeth!" she heard the male voice call.
Azazel looked up and turned back, he leaned down and peered intently into her eyes, "My little Faith, you are it."
Then he was gone, like a flash, nothing was there. She heard her father, smelled him first, his soft musk mixed with her mother's. She felt his presence by the crib as he looked in on her, that's when she saw the drip fall on his face. And she giggled, of all things she thought, she giggled. Her father looked up, above her crib there sprawled across the ceiling her mother's body.
In minutes she felt and saw the orange warmth, felt her father's hands grab around her armpits, lift and she was out. She felt herself carried to the next door and felt another weight against her father's body, she saw her sister waking up in their father's arms. Faith felt the wind run passed her as she was rushed outside. She heard her father say, "Take them." She felt his lips on her head, as he placed her in another's arms and ran back in.
Then it stopped.
She looked back at the stunned demon, his eyes still yellow as when she first beheld them. He looked at her intently his grin spread thinner across his face, "Even more stronger then I was capable of thinking and always eager to please, in showmanship. Now it is time my Faith, I will show you what you can do, beyond those things within the walls of your school. You will get glory, status, and all that you know you deserve. You will be a Queen and control the most powerful army that will have ever existed. Control over all and all with a simple price," his voice stopped.
Faith could only stare, she felt compelled to only do just that, then a familiar drop dripped upon her cheek. This was warm, fresh, it felt. Her eyes looked up, her face followed too. The yellow flashed past her pupils, she heard Azazel say, "Just a simple causality. No need to worry."
She turned her head back down, Azazel grinned at her, as he saw her grin appear across her face. "My Faith, I will let you have the honors, once more." He traced her skin with his fingers again.
Then the silence was broken, Faith felt herself stunned back to reality, she looked at Azazel his finger still on her chin. His grin was gone, but the smell of wood burning had sparked, but a little. Azazel refused to move, till his body was thrown across the room, he looked up. Shocked pressed across his face, he looked back slumped on the ground, felt his throat begin to close. He looked at Faith, his eyes began to bug, but his thoughts remained calm.
He focused his eyes, forced his color back, and fought against the strength that hurled him there. He fought, but was barley winning, he brought his hands to his throat and held them there. Still his thoughts remained the same and a simple word spread out of his voice as his brain finished all that he knew she saw, "Finish!"
Then his head fell back, his jaw spread open, and smoke spread up and out through the ceiling. The body slumped to the ground, done.
Faith stood there, she looked at his host again, her eyes readjusted, she looked up. Something moved within her; a click, a snap, within her mind her face lost its color, her face became pale, white as a sheet. The features formed differently from what they were accustomed to. Then her head snapped forward and looked ahead the sound of a door beginning opened and closed, and a similar voice called out. She listened, grabbed the body and moved him with her mind. As the door of the bathroom crept open, she pushed the body in, and turned around as she began to cross the threshold. Faith's eyes looked again at the ceiling, her eyes felt drained, darkened by the sight, at her memory repeated. Her eyes narrowed as she stared forever, the vision within her mind finished, the longest of visions she had ever had, had finished its run through her mind, then it was done.
She heard his steps and closed the door only a little, leaving a crack, leaving on the light that Jess had left on. She listened as he came within the room. She heard the bed creek as he fell upon the mattress, she peaked out of the crack, she watched him notice the drops that fell on his face, watched Jess's blood not once but twice, then another drip on his forehead. "No!"
A door slammed open downstairs, "Sam!"
She felt the warmth of the fire start to consume the room, she waited. The second familiar man ran to the threshold and stopped but for a second, then ran to Sam, and grabbed him. He pushed him out the door, as Sam yelled back for Jess.
The room became silent; she listened to any heartbeats left in any apartments. And then she moved, crept open the door, and slithered to the bedroom door. She stood at its opening and watched the blaze take hold of the mass on the ceiling that had once been her sister, and was gone.
The fire simmered by the water before it could reach any other part of the apartments. Tenants, firefighters, and neighbors stood watching the window that the flames had escaped from, as the firefighters worked to make sure no other flames would burst out. No one noticed the pure altered colored eyes peering from the farthest side of the buildings, where the fire had never reached. The eyes started to move forwards stopping at the far end of the group of people watching the firefighters. The face was withdrawn, stern, her chin was turned down, and the eyes looked up, barely blinking. Her right leg stuck rudely out, her left leg straight, her arms remained crossed, her eyes flickered, and she heard his words in his head now before he even said them,
"We've got work to do."
Her deep imbedded grin returned and yellow flashed across her eyes, as the darkened mass began to take hold, solid in every inch of her eyes.