Author's note: Thanks to Ghastly Eternity for test- and beta-reading and thanks to everyone who reviewed. Seriously, people it means a lot to me and I'd be very happy if you kept/started reviewing!
Okay, I thought I wouldn't let all of you wait for too long after the last chapter ended on a can expect rather regular updates on this.
2
"Drop the gun," Leo demanded.
It wasn't like Sam had much of a choice, as two guns were aimed at him that very moment, so even if he could be faster than one of them, the other one would get him for sure. He slowly raised his hands defensively and let the gun drop to the floor. Going along with their demands should give him some time at least.
He wondered how long it would take until Dean would think about contacting either one of them, but he was quite sure that it would be too long. He'd have to come up with something by himself, only that seemed pretty damn impossible in the position he was in.
"Didn't think you could just start the Apocalypse without there being consequences, did you?" Kyle asked in a venomous tone.
If Sam had had any hopes that they wouldn't actually shoot him, they were gone after seeing the unmasked hate directed at him by those two.
"I'd really like to know who's spreading that rumor. It's getting out of hand," he tried to get them to at least doubt about his case, but really he knew it was senseless. The two hunters had clearly made up their minds and thought this through, which couldn't mean anything good for him.
As little as Sam liked the thought, but it seemed letting the last hunters, who had confronted him about this, go had been a bad move. He liked the thought what it would say about him, if he had just murdered them in cold blood, even less however.
"When it was just Gordon Walker talking about how you were some sort of demon child, anti-Christ, whatever it was he believed that was just a madman talking," Leo spoke in a deadly cold tone, gesturing for Sam to move toward the living room, "But it is getting hard to ignore how certain things always seem to happen around you."
If the other hunter wouldn't have been clearly capable of doing basically anything, Sam might have pointed out how the same things were happening around Dean. It wasn't like many people had been present for most of the incidents they were talking about, and most of those who had been present were people Sam trusted without a doubt. There could only be rumors and very few actual witness reports. Pointing out that most of the witnesses of anything being unusual about Sam were dead, in fact, wouldn't help him any either though.
Actually, at this point the younger Winchester started to wonder what would happen, if either of them pulled the trigger. It wasn't a question about what Dean would do once he found out, either. It was more of a question about what Lucifer or the angels would do. As Sam understood it, he had to be alive to give his consent to Satan taking over his body, which was a pretty safe guess, if you thought about it. So everybody, who wanted the Apocalypse to happen the way it apparently was supposed to, would be interested in Sam being alive.
He wasn't sure how he felt about the thought of being brought back to life just to be Lucifer's meat-suit. No, scratch that, actually he knew quite well how he felt about that possibility. It sucked big time!
"Have you ever thought about the job we're doing? Of course there's freaky stuff happening!" Sam went for the logical argument, yet again. Keeping them talking and listening at the very least would make time pass, and that would give Dean a chance to catch on and come to the rescue, or get shot himself. Damn, the options really sucked out loud!
"You know, Sam," Kyle started with a snort, "Save your breath. You were the one to confess to some of our friends, after all."
That was the moment when Sam really wished with all his heart that he had killed those hunters back then and if that made him a horrible person or less of a human being even, then he didn't care. Like he had to worry about where his soul would be going, anyway, he was the freaking vessel of the freaking devil!
"I don't like it when other people take all the credit for my hard work," the sickeningly sweet voice of a little blonde girl waved through the broken front door before the conversation between the three men could go any further.
Sam could basically feel how he turned paler. Other than the other two, he recognized the demon in front of him immediately. He knew what she was capable of and he had thought he knew that she was dead.
"Lilith," he whispered and swallowed heavily. Talk about making a bad situation worse! It wasn't very often that Sam felt close to actual panic, but that moment he did.
Leo and Kyle were quick on the uptake, realizing that something was definitely very wrong with the little girl just moments after the younger Winchester had recognized her, but that didn't help them any. Lilith had them both disarmed and pressed up against the nearest wall within the blink of an eye.
Sam sort of envied them their locations as soon as the young blonde walked up to him, however.
It looked like the other two hunters were trying to say something, or maybe just shout out loud, but they were lacking their voices for the moment being.
"I've been working on the entire Apocalypse so hard," Lilith stated with a pout that would have looked natural on the face of any actual little girl, "And now everybody is saying that you did it! Meany!"
From their position against the wall Leo and Kyle were looking at Sam and Lilith with big eyes. Sure, if a demon told them of Sam's innocence, they believed it immediately! Not that the younger Winchester would even dream of complaining about that.
Something was very definitely wrong, however, and it wasn't only that Lilith was supposed to be dead.
Castiel had been dead and had been brought back. It didn't seem too likely that the same power had brought Lilith back, but if the – technically – good guys could do it, then surely the bad guys would have their ways as well. Hell, for all Sam knew, this might be Lilith's reward for being so successful with breaking the seals.
Why would she go and sort of testify in favor of Sam, however?
Oh, there might be a million reasons for that, but none the younger Winchester would like any, for sure.
"It's too bad that none of you will be left alive to spread the real story," Lilith mused before she clapped and added with childish glee, "I'll just have to kill all the other liars as well then!"
All three men were struggling, but neither of them were getting anywhere with it. A very little but vocal part of Sam wished to have some of his psychic powers back, if only so he'd have a fighting chance. Of course, thoughts like these were the exact reason why he was in this exact situation in the first place.
Lilith moved to stand in the middle between her three victims before she pointed her finger at Sam and started to recite a counting-out rhyme.
"Eeny, meeny, miny, moe, catch a tiger by the toe. If he hollers, let him go, eeny, meeny, miny, moe," she sing-songed, before her finger once more landed on the younger Winchester, "Yay, you won!"
Sam had been about to start to protest, but before he could say even one word Lilith stared at the front of her pink, frilly dress, where a red stain was rapidly forming. She fell to the floor, which confirmed what Sam had thought had happened the second he had caught sight of his older brother, behind her. The knife was still sticking out of Lilith's back, which made for a very gruesome picture. The demon had had possessed a little girl after all, but there had been nothing else Dean could have done. Not against a demon of Lilith's caliber, anyway.
"Hey Sam, sorry, really," Leo stated after he and his partner had gotten their ability to speak and move back.
Sam didn't think that saying sorry quite cut it in this case, but since, technically, they had been right with their accusations all along, he didn't say anything, but just shot them a murderous glare. They got the hint and left in a hurry.
Dean was left standing the only one only knowing half of what had just happened. "What the hell?" he asked, after watching the other two hunters leave like the house was about to be swallowed up by the Earth.
"I'll tell you later," Sam promised, his eyes glued to Lilith's body on the floor. Something about this felt so very off, that he just couldn't trust that she'd stay dead. Really, how long and how hard had they tried to kill her the first time around? And suddenly the knife alone should have been enough to accomplish that?
"No, Sam, first you three leave me alone with the werewolf, it went over well, by the way," Dean ranted, though his eyes wouldn't leave the demon's body for longer than a second either, "Then I get your text-message –"
The older Winchester didn't get to finish his statement, because his brother interrupted him. "What do you mean? What message?"
"The one about your sorry ass being in danger," Dean elaborated a little, which didn't help Sam to understand what had happened.
"I didn't send you one," the younger Winchester replied in a definite tone of voice. Sure, he had wished he would have gotten to notify Dean in some way, but he knew for a fact that he hadn't.
"I did," the body on the floor started to speak, which made both Winchesters jump. Dean immediately reached for his gun and Sam quickly moved to pick the one he had had to drop before up.
What happened then wasn't the freakiest thing they had ever seen by far, but it surely was unexpected all the same. Before their eyes the young girl transformed into a man they both could identify easily enough.
"Gabriel," the brothers exclaimed nearly in unison.
"The one and only," the archangel replied, as casually as a man lying on his stomach with a knife in his back could. The smirk that just had to be on his face could be heard in his voice. "Now take that knife out of my back, it's getting itchy!"
Dean didn't move, but Sam pulled the knife out of the angel's flesh. After all the guy had just saved his neck for all it looked like, though Sam had a hard time believing that he had done it out of the goodness of his heart.
"That's better," Gabriel sighed contently and stretched excessively as he stood in front of the Winchesters.
"Somebody tell me, what the fuck happened here this instant!" Dean demanded hotly because there just were too many things he didn't know about.
"Oh, I just saved your brother's sorry ass and made sure that the next rumor about the Apocalypse will not be about him, but about Lilith," Gabriel explained with a casual shrug, "Nice to see you, too. We have so much to talk about!"