Demon Game
Chapter Two: The Acheri
The story continues! Please read and enjoy. :)
November 27, 2006
"We can't do this!" Hailey said for the third time in the last hour since Azazel had disappeared. "We can't kill each other!"
Ava rubbed at her temples to try and stave off the growing headache. Hailey had been growing increasingly hysterical in that time and it was really starting to grate on her nerves.
"We don't even know each other," said Jordan, the tall guy. "Why would we?"
"Probably because Azazel is gonna just kill us if we don't," Ava spoke up from her corner of the abandoned store they had taken shelter in. "You know, it's really cold right now. You think you could make us a fire to warm up with?"
"We're in a wooden structure," Jordan said slowly like he thought she was stupid.
"Ronald here can punch through the floor, then," Ava sighed, "and then we can settle down there with some heat. Seriously, I'm gonna freeze to death soon."
"And I won't?" said Hailey, voice still tinged with hysteria. "I'm from Vegas!"
Ava refrained from rolling her eyes. "Then heat is a great idea."
Ronald scowled. "I don't think —"
"So you do want to freeze," Ava sniped, stepping forward. "Look, Azazel's a nasty demon with nasty plans, so listening to him is probably the last thing any of us wants to do right now."
"A demon," echoed Jordan with a look.
Ava rolled her eyes this time. "His eyes were yellow, Jordan," she snapped. "You ever see anything like that before?"
"Well, no —"
"Most demons have black eyes," Ava cut Jordan off, "but Azazel's kinda like their leader."
"So why are we here?" asked Ronald.
Ava sighed. "Wasn't he clear? We've all got special abilities, but he only needs the best of us."
"The best," said Jordan.
"There's a lot more of us out there," Ava explained. "He went to great lengths to create our existence."
"Create?" Hailey echoed.
Ava closed her eyes and rubbed at her temples once again. This was going to take awhile, she could tell. "Maybe if we could work on the fire thing first?"
Jordan and Ronald exchanged glances before Ronald shrugged and started punching his way through the floor. "Thank you," Ava said, working hard to keep the sarcasm from her voice. Ten minutes later, the group of four had a fire going.
"You said this Aza-guy —"
"Azazel," Ava corrected Ronald.
"Right. You said he created us?"
Ava nodded. "At the age of six months, he came into our nurseries and fed us demon blood, which is pretty much the source of our abilities, or the thing that unlocks it." She shrugged. "Point is, there's dozens of us out there, but Azazel only requires one to lead his demon army."
"So he wants us to duke it out and gain himself a heavyweight champion?" said Jordan with raised eyebrows. "I'm sorry, but demons? They don't exist."
"The Catholic Church has said otherwise," said Ava. "Right? I mean, they've got all their exorcisms and holy water — and it works. I've seen someone who was possessed by a demon go through an exorcism and survive."
"So, what, they went all rotating heads and pea soup on you?"
Ava groaned in frustration. "This isn't some movie, Ronald! Demons are vicious, throat-slitting sons-of-bitches who would kill you without a second thought!"
"So why haven't they just killed us?" asked Jordan.
"Azazel ordered them not to," Ava answered. "They won't help us stay alive, though. I knew a guy who could electrocute people to death and a demon in the area killed some other people and then let some Hunter take him out without a backwards glance."
"Hunter?" said Hailey.
"People who kill all things supernatural," Ava explained.
"How do you know all this?" asked Ronald.
"I know two Hunters," Ava said. "Sam and Dean Winchester. Sam's just like us, but he's a Hunter, too."
"And he didn't kill you?" said Jordan.
Ava rolled her eyes. "If he'd been like the one who took out my friend, then he'd have to commit suicide for having visions like me." She wasn't sure why she didn't tell them everything else Sam was capable of, but it somehow didn't seem important enough to mention. "He and his brother were the ones who told me everything I know."
There was a moment of silence.
"How do we get outta here?" asked Hailey. "I just wanna go back home."
"So do I," said Ava, "but you heard Azazel. We try to leave and we die."
"Would he really do that?" asked Ronald.
"He killed Sam and Dean's mom just because she walked into Sam's nursery at the wrong time," Ava said softly. "He's a demon, and he could do worse things to us than just drop us in the middle of a ghost town and demand we play ultimate survivor."
No one said anything to that.
April 25, 2007
Dean and Bobby met outside of Omaha on a two-lane road early the next morning. It was still raining, and Sam was still missing. Dean had called Ash at the Roadhouse while he made the drive, hoping that if Bobby didn't have anything for him, that maybe the mullet-tastic man would. He knew it might not be possible given that the man had never been able to find traces of the others who had gone missing, but he had to hope that maybe this time…
Bobby spread out a map on the hood of his truck. "Here's all the demonic activity over the last month."
Dean stared. "There's nothing," he said, meeting Bobby's eyes. "How can there be nothing?"
"I don't know," Bobby sighed. "Nothing big or low-level… It's been dead quiet."
"That doesn't make sense," Dean said, looking back down at the map in agitation. "How is that possible?" He ran a hand through his hair. "Dammit, that means were looking for a needle in a three-thousand mile haystack!"
"I'm sorry, Dean," Bobby sighed, "I don't know what to tell you."
"So, what do we do, close our eyes and just point?"
Bobby rolled his eyes. "We'll find him," he said.
Just then, Dean's phone rang. He flipped it open at once. "Ash?"
"Yep, it's me."
Dean closed his eyes. "Please tell me you found something."
"It's a negatory on Sam, man," Ash said, sounding slightly uneasy, "just like all the special kids I've tried to track since December, but I did manage to find… something else."
"Well?" Dean said after a moment. "What is it?"
"You've gotta come over here."
"Dude, I don't have the time —"
"You need to make the time," Ash snapped, and Dean had never heard the Lynyrd Skynyrd roadie sound so serious. He was silent for a long moment. "Not only did I find something that'll help us find Sam beyond the shadow of a doubt, but this — this is huge. Seriously, you need to get over here."
"Fine," Dean said. "We'll be there in an hour." He snapped his phone shut. "Looks like we're goin' to the Roadhouse."
Bobby smiled slightly. "All right," he said. "Let's go."
Dean nodded silently and stalked to over to the Impala. He needed to find Sam so badly it hurt.
I'll find you, he swore to his brother as Bobby got into the car and he started the engine. Whatever it took, he'd find Sam.
No matter what.
"Excuse me?" Lily said after some length of time. "Did you just say —?"
"Demons," Sam said. "Yes. They're real. Look," he said when he sensed the disbelief in both Jake and Lily, "you're both twenty-three, and you were both born one month premature in the months of either May or June."
"How —?" Lily started.
"About a year and a half ago, you got these headaches, and then you found you could do things," Sam cut Lily off, wanting to get through the convincing stage quickly enough so they could get to the escaping stage. "Things you didn't believe were possible. I started having visions."
"I'm empathic," Danielle spoke up, "feeling other people's emotions."
"I can put thoughts in people's heads," Andy said, "like a Jedi Knight." He smiled encouragingly. "And don't worry, it doesn't work on people like us."
"Visions? Sensing what people are feeling at any moment?" Lily was starting to get upset, and Sam knew why as she looked at Andy. "You go, 'Simon says give me your wallet', and they do?" She shook her head. "That's fucking great! I'd kill for something like that."
Sam stayed silent.
"Lily —" Danielle said, but the other girl cut her off.
"Don't tell me it's okay, cause it's not," Lily snapped. "I — God, I touch people —"
"And their hearts stop," Sam finished for her.
"How do you know that?" Lily asked after a very long moment.
Sam sighed and looked away. "I have visions, remember?" he said. "I can't control what I see."
Lily didn't say anything for a long while. "You… you didn't see the day that I —?"
Sam swallowed and looked back at her. "Your girlfriend," he whispered. "I swear I can't control it."
A tear made its way down Lily's face. "Why didn't you try and find me, warn me?"
Sam dropped his gaze again. "My vision happened on July thirty-first," he said. "By the time I looked you up —"
"That's the day it happened," Lily whispered. "Why didn't you have it any sooner?"
"I told you," Sam said, "I have never been able to control when a vision happens, and every time, I watch someone die. I can't —" He broke off and turned away.
"Sam, it's okay," Danielle whispered, reaching out and squeezing his hand.
There was another moment of silence.
"I'm sorry," Lily whispered. "It's just — all these different abilities, and I get one that kills people that I can't control."
"I knew a kid who electrocuted people to death," Sam sighed, still turned away. "He was killed before he learned to control it."
After another moment, Jake spoke up. "You said demons brought us here? Why should I believe something like that?"
"What's your ability?" Andy asked.
"I'm strong," Jake said after a few seconds. "Guy flipped his vehicle on a bad road and got pinned underneath. I lifted it off him like it was nothing, and everyone said it was just some freak adrenaline thing."
"Except you did it again," Danielle said.
"Bench-pressed 800 pounds, stone-cold calm."
"That one comes in handy with demons," Danielle sighed.
"What, you believe him?" Jake asked.
Danielle gave out a dark laugh and Sam turned back to face Jake and Lily. "I've seen demons before," she said, "and by the way, Sam's got the super-strength thing, too."
"Wait, I thought you said you had visions," Lily said.
Sam nodded silently.
"But then —" Lily broke off. "You know what? Never mind." She raised her hands slightly and turned away with a heaving sigh. "I just wanna go home."
"And you think we don't?" Jake said, glancing at her. "Look," he said to Sam, "demons aren't real."
"My dad was possessed by one," Danielle replied calmly, "and another killed my husband a year ago. Sam's telling the truth."
"I guess you two were never visited in your dreams by a man with yellow eyes?" Sam finally asked. Lily shook her head and Jake frowned for a moment before shaking his.
"He has," Danielle breathed, "but I don't think he'll believe us without proof."
"There's no demons nearby," Sam replied just as softly before raising his voice again. "Look, we were all brought here for some reason, so the best we can do for now is stick together until we figure out what's going on."
"I thought you said demons did it," Jake said snidely.
"They brought us here, yes," Sam said, tamping down hard on his frustration, "but there aren't any around right now, which means we've got no way of finding out why they brought us here, let alone what they want."
"We should leave, then," Lily said. "I don't like it, here."
"We don't even know where here is," Danielle said, "but it's obvious we're in a ghost town surrounded by a forest." She paused and shivered. "Gives new meaning to the phrase, doesn't it?" she said to Sam.
Sam smiled slightly and nodded. "I'm pretty sure this place isn't haunted, but…" He turned and looked around. "There might be some identifying markers that could give us a location. I've read up on a lot of ghost towns over the years."
"I think that's as good an idea as any," Danielle said.
Sam looked over at Jake and Lily. "Look," he said, "I know none of this makes any sense to you, but just — stay close for now until we figure things out, all right?"
Jake didn't look happy, but he nodded silently, Lily doing the same a moment later.
"Great," Sam said. "C'mon, we need to see if there's anything that tells us where we are." Without waiting for an answer, Sam started making his way down the dirt street, Danielle and Andy right behind him with the other two trailing just behind them.
"How did you know I was born a month early?" asked Jake after a few seconds.
"Because we all were," Sam answered absently. "My birthday's May second, Andy's is June thirtieth, and Danielle's is on May eighth." He continued moving forward, looking around for something that might tell him where they were.
"I guess you know how we all got our abilities, too?" Jake asked next.
Sam sighed and stopped walking, taking a moment before turning to face the tall army guy. "A demon named Azazel made a Deal with our mothers ten years before we were born to save our fathers from certain death. My mom did it to bring my dad back from the dead. Danielle's mom saved her dad from a heart condition that almost killed him. We were born ten years later, and six months after that, Azazel came to collect."
"Collect how?" Lily asked.
"He fed us demon blood," Sam answered, taking in Lily's disbelief. "Look, I've known about demons and werewolves and spirits and ghouls my entire life. My mom was burned alive on the ceiling of my nursery because she tried to stop Azazel from doing anything to me, so knowing this kind of stuff is pretty much my life."
"My God," Lily whispered after a moment. "He killed your mom?"
Sam nodded. "He did the same to my adoptive mom," Andy spoke up. "My dad never talked about it, nor did he go on a life-long search to try and find the demon."
"Not all dad's are as obsessive as mine was," Sam said, smiling sadly as he thought of John.
"This is a lot to take in," said Jake. "You're seriously tellin' me that all those things you see in the movies are real?"
"Not Bigfoot," Sam said, "and vampires are different than what most mythology says, and werewolves don't actually transform into full wolf forms, either, but yeah, a lot of that stuff is real."
"And you fight it?" Lily asked.
"The family business," Sam sighed, "literally. My mom's family did it, and she tried to leave it all behind until she died, and then my dad learned and taught us everything, instead."
"Ouch," Andy murmured. "You never mentioned that, before."
Sam shrugged silently, turning away and casting his eyes around before a sizable bell caught his attention. It looked familiar. "I recognize that," he said, moving towards it and ignoring the others.
The bell had an oak tree on it. Fantastic, Sam thought to himself.
"We're in Cold Oak, South Dakota," he said. "All the residents fled because they swore the town was haunted."
"But there's nothing here," Danielle said. "You're sure that's where we are?"
"I remember reading about this place when I was in high school," Sam answered.
"You've got a good memory," Andy remarked.
"There's a reason Dean calls me a nerd," Sam said with a small grin. "Anyway, now that we know where we are, the next step is looking around for any provisions and anything we could use to protect and defend ourselves."
"Why?" asked Lily.
"Because knowing where we are still doesn't tell us why we're here," Danielle said.
Sam nodded. "Let's start with these buildings over here," he told them, pointing to the nearest structures. "Hang onto to anything iron, and lemme know if you find any salt."
"Salt?" asked Jake.
"Protection," said Danielle.
"Seriously?" Jake said.
"It's a brave new world," Sam dead-panned. He turned to head into the building when he sensed a demon approaching rapidly. "Shit," he hissed, "everyone, get inside now, we've gotta find salt and iron pronto."
"A demon's coming already?" asked Andy, looking alarmed. Sam nodded and turned to look out at the sky above the trees. Already he could see the black smoke of the approaching demon.
"That's it out there," he said, pointing. Lily let out a loud gasp and Sam grasped her shoulder. "C'mon."
The five of them headed into the building and quickly started searching out cupboards, closets, trunks and whatever else they could see that might hold something.
"I got salt!" yelled Andy as Sam grabbed an iron poker from the fireplace.
"Everyone in here now!" Sam shouted. He felt the other four approaching, felt the demon coming right to their doorstep, and then Lily screamed. "Dammit," Sam cursed under his breath as he headed in the blonde's direction.
He found Lily backed against a wall with a small girl standing before her, face distorted and with long nails that were almost like claws. Sam reacted at once, swinging the poker straight through the girl's midsection and she turned back into black smoke at once, letting out an ear-piercing shriek and zooming away until Sam couldn't sense it any longer. "You okay?" he asked Lily.
Lily nodded, looking rather faint.
"That was a demon?" came Jake's voice from down the hall.
"I'm pretty sure it was an Acheri," Sam answered, "a type of demon that disguises itself as a little girl." He ran a hand through his hair. "We need to find supplies and set up somewhere safe as soon as possible."
The lack of arguments came as a blessing.
Dean was beginning to understand just how much shit could go wrong in the space of an hour.
Pan right to the burned-down structure of the Roadhouse.
"No," he breathed, slamming on the Impala's breaks and quickly putting the car into park. He stumbled from the car, staring at the wreckage. Nothing but debris was left, and the fire wasn't completely put out, either. "No," he said again.
"Dean —" Bobby said.
"Ash!" Dean yelled, striding forward and into the wreckage. "Ellen, Jo!"
No one answered.
The worst part was seeing the burned corpses and not knowing who they had been before being roasted alive.
"Dammit!" Dean lashed out, kicking over a burnt wooden beam and causing it to tumble to the scorched ground. "How the hell am I gonna find Sam now?"
"Dean, calm down," Bobby called as he approached.
Dean couldn't stop from glaring at the older man. "You're kidding, right?" he snarled. "Sam was taken from right under my nose! We weren't talking and it wasn't even Sam's fault —" He broke off and ran his hands through his hair. "I've gotta find him, Bobby. I promised Dad I'd watch out for him."
"I know, son," Bobby said quietly. "We'll find him. There's gotta be another way."
Dean sure hoped so.
TBC...
