I DO NOT OWN AND OF THE CHARACTERS DEPICTED IN THE SUPERNATURAL TV SHOW. ANY OC (ASHLING/ETC.) BELONGS TO ME AND YOU DO NOT HAVE PERMISSION TO USE HER WITHOUT PERMISSION.
Thank you and I hope you like. I want to thank my beta reader Hannah for helping me. She knows who she is and she is a lifesaver. I am a very slow writer so please be patient with me. Thank you. I am rating this M for later content as this will be a story not snippet.
Los Angeles, California: June 15th 2005: Friday 10 am
Ashling had been seeing things. She knew something was wrong, and when she checked her calender, she was right. It was almost time to pay the debt. She booked the first flight to Louisiana, where an old friend was who could help her. Until then...heavy sedatives and praying to a god she doesn't believe in will have to be enough till her plane touches down. The dreams though...those weren't much better.
When her plane touched down, she was immediately ushered into a car and driven to a remote location. Swamp land consumed the back of the property. Ashling now had memories of the time she first left Ireland for the states. She had a performance that night, but it was only the afternoon, so the girl decided to sight see. She wandered the streets and backwoods for hours, into the late afternoon. But then Ashling met someone on those back roads. He was a middle aged man who was pretty terrifying to a naive Irish girl of 18 at the time. He looked to be in his 50's. He was a short man with paint on his face. It blacked the skin around his eyes. His eyes were almost ash in color, and they held time she would never know. His hair was in dreadlocks with salt and pepper patches throughout the pitch black strands. When he spoke his words came out in slurred strings. A richness to them she'd only heard in the blues' halls since her arrival.
The man's eyes were piercing and he exclaimed that he saw something wicked about her. "Cursed one", he called her. One who was destined for darkness and pain. Ashling thought he was crazy, until he told her he could see she had made the Devil's Deal. They bonded. He was so full of knowledge. She found him to be like one of the men who often drank at her mother's pub. Telling her tales of their experiences and stories of monsters and magic. He entertained her with the local lore, wards, and good luck charms. When she left the man that afternoon, he had said that she was always welcome. And she was going to take advantage of that now.
As soon as she approached the door to the broken down Shack the door flung open and her old friend stood with knowing eyes. The past 8 years had not been kind. He looked haggard now, his hair grayer. Eyes deeper, more sad then the last time they had seen one another. When he spoke though, that same richness and backwater slur filled her hear with hope and familiarity.
"Child you need the goofer juice. Come in, we have much to discuss."
She smiled nervously and walked into the familiar comfort of the shack.
Unknown Location (Mansion): June 16th 2005: Saturday 10:05pm
A very nervous-looking demon knocks on the door of what looks to be an office.
"Sir?" he meekly asks. "I-I have news on a collection."
The doors opened of their on volition, and seated at a large oak desk is a man. Clothed in a black silken suit, a blood red tie, and a glass of single malt scotch whiskey in one hand. The man has short hair and a receding hair-line, a bit of scruff too.
"Well?" the man replies, not raising his eyes from his papers.
The demon gulps and speaks again."Uh...sir. It's about the soul of one, Ashling McPhereson."
"What about it." the seated gentlemen inquires bluntly, turning a leaf of paper over.
"She's..running...Crowley, Sir." the timid demon replies.
A wicked grin comes to Crowley's face.
"Perfect." he spat. "Now, get out, you prat. I'll deal with it myself. Your incompetence is astonishing." he retorts. And with that he vanishes from the demon's sight.
Shreveport, Louisiana: June 16th 2005: Saturday 10:20pm
Ashling cowered in a run-down abandoned shack near the tree lines, away from the gorgeous water of the town. It was pitch black inside. She was crying hysterically.
"Leave me alone!" she screamed. "Please!? I don't want to die!? Make these nightmares stop!"
Her nose and cheeks were puffy and red, her eyes no better. The mossy green of her eyes almost demonic against the bloodshot white. Her hands covered her ears, as the wind whipped the shack. Then came the snarling and snapping teeth at the doors...the Hell Hounds were closing in.
She had barred every entrance with old wood beams and lined them with goofer juice. She had held them off for hours, but they were getting even more brutal.
They had rammed the walls like angry bulls. Every contact sounded like a thunder clap and caused her to jump. On top of all that, the hallucinations were getting worse and worse..gods... the hallucinations. It was maddening. The trembling girl was so wrapped up in her own head, she barely noticed how the wind and dogs had stopped.
It was suddenly quiet. She didn't dare move, because she could still smell the stench of sulfur, rotten flesh, and blood in the air.
A voice called out. Condescending and familiar yet...different. She heard a British accent, but the way he spoke was unmistakeable.
"Come now, love," Crowley said, lacing his voice with charm. "You know you can't escape. We have a contract. You're lucky it's me. I don't show up for nobodies, but I made the deal so I thought I'd stop by."
He sounded confident, but there was an obvious annoyance to his tone.
He passed in front of the shack and took in a sharp breath biting his lower lip, before his lower jaw lay slack as he looked up annoyed that this girl dared try his patience after being so generous. "Love! I can get in there anytime I choose," he stated, in a low rumble. "You WILL pay up."
He walked away from the door a ways, then turned with a grin, his white teeth flashing in the dark. The large moon above illuminated the lonely patch of the earth they inhabited, the wind kicking up once again and snaking under the door. Ashling gasped and sunk against the wall further as she watched the goofer juice dissipate into nothing.
The door flung open with a resounding slam, nails flew from the frame and shards of the little tinted window from the door. Sleek, black formal loafers crunched as heavy foot fall met glass. Floor boards creaked in Crowley's wake. Ashling's head rose with her blood shot eyes and tear streaked cheeks. Her's met the eyes of the man who held her contract. Before she knew it, he had his fist firmly buried into her tangled red mane close to the scalp. He dragged her with annoyance written all over his features and she writhed in his grip, kicking and screaming through tears as she was dragged from the shack. Streaks of crimson blossomed from cuts given by the glass on the floor and gravel from the old road just beyond the thresh hold. She could smell the dogs much more clearly now that she was outside. Her tears wouldn't stop as they stung her cheeks, and when she was released, she lay at his feet weeping and begging for mercy. She said she would do anything if he didn't kill her. The dogs crept closer, snarling as their ghostly prints surrounded her in the dust. She let out a small scream as one snarled just over her shoulder from behind. The hot dampness from it making her whimper in terror.
Crowley knelt in front of her with a wicked grin.
"What could you possibly offer me?" he asked with a taunt to his tone.
The last thing Ashling saw were his green blue eyes, before a searing hot pain enveloped her. His hands were inside of her temples and she screeched wretchedly. It felt like he was setting her insides on fire and melting her flesh from her bones. He was reaching deep into her mind, deep into places she never wished to return.
When the demon finished, she slumped over in a heap face to the dirt, gasping from pain and the sudden need for air.
"What a wicked, wicked thing you are," she heard him remark, a touch of amusement in his voice.
"You don't believe in the Big Man upstairs, but you go to church like a good little Irish Catholic girl, and lie to everyone. You even go so far as to have wished that instead of dance you had wished your mother, teachers, other kids...hell the town you grew up in, dead. Wiped off the map. What I couldn't quite figure out is why, love? Maybe I have use of you yet. You won't die tonight."
Ashling looked up with a glimmer of hope before he snapped his fingers, and the hounds ripped her limb from limb as she screamed out in agony for anyone to help her.
Crowley turned away and looked up to the sky and gave a small laugh as he grinned.
"Well...not technically dead."
