Chapter 1:

"I managed to capture one of them." Crowley began as he led Castiel inside the dimly lit room.

The room looked almost eerily the same from the hideout where Crowley had imprisoned the Alphas and monsters in the cells, even the tiled cracked walls were the same except the colors, gurney lined against the wall and chains littered around the floors.

In the center of the room was a man tied on the chair with chains and heavy ropes. Castiel found the man extremely ordinary in appearance: bald, bearded and plump with his mailman suit, except for the part that his clothes were dirty with blood, bruised and gash lining on his face and its eyes were completely black with pinpricks.

"For some reason, the devil's trap and holy water doesn't work on them." Crowley gestured at the gallon bottled waters, bloodstained blades and surgical instruments on the table near the mailman and then indicated the ceiling above with his finger.

Castiel looked up; the ceiling had the perfect pentagram the devil's trap above the mailman.

"Funny enough, iron, salt and the angel's blade do work. Exorcism has the usual painful effect but it seems they're unable to leave their meatsuit."

"I didn't know you were an angel's bitch." The mailman chimed with a dreamy smile and Castiel received the impression the man was drugged against his will, pumped the drug full beyond the human's limit.

"Trust me, being his bitch is better than anyone, including your dear ol' Luc." Crowley smirked but then he mildly glared at Castiel, "Although, I have been yanked around for that fact."

Crowley was right. It was a demon, indeed. Castiel could see the demon's true face as it grinned at the angel, so mangled, so torn and so deformed but when he searched further, he found it was incomplete.

"It's halfway demon." Castiel stated blandly.

"I know. I still can see humanity on him but it smell rotten to the core." He wrinkled his nose as if it the scent was putrid enough.

"Ironically, that's how I think of you."

"Say whatever you want, but I know you like me better than the other hell spawns." Crowley teased.

The angel wisely ignored the comment, "How did you manage to subdue him?"

"Witches, mostly." Crowley said, "I had few of them in my pockets and they located him easily but bringing him here was bit a pickle, heard it was grisly at the end." He made an empty gesture with his hand, "Ehh, Those hags always complain. Crowley, he killed my familiar!" He mimicked a pitched high voice.

The half-demon twittered at this.

Crowley raised his eyebrow and asked the mailman, "Fond memories there, mate?"

"She tasted delicious." The mailman half-moaned and half-groaned as he licked his lip.

Crowley grimaced, "Not ordinary demon at all." He said to Castiel, "We don't go for Dr. Lecter, no matter how they gently cook the livers in pate-de-foie-grass."

"This is troubling." Castiel said, his eyes sweeping the mailman with a detached calculation. "How they're doing it?"

"That's good question which unfortunately I don't have the answer for." Crowley told him, "The Stagecoach Mary isn't talking except going postal when I come near to him with the angel's blade."

"Shall I assume this is not the first earthbound demons you chained?"

Crowley had almost forgotten this, the businesslike, cold battle-hardened warrior Castiel was. It was almost a figment ghost of an old partnership they both had when they were looking for Purgatory.

"Nor the first I tortured."

"And you found nothing from it?"

"Oh I found something, alright but it doesn't make sense; it was mostly gibberish and jabber between the harmonies of screams." Crowley looked at the mailman whose head lolled backward, its black eyes glazed, "I suspect they don't know they're becoming Bloody Barony. They haven't kidnapped by anyone or had disappearing acts. No demonic signs around them when their souls was in the beginning stage of corruption. The only thing I found out is that they were becoming violent. We also ransacked their house for any sign of witchery or demonic. So far, nada."

"Crudely put, someone is doing this behind the scene, without their knowledge." Castiel summarized for himself.

The former King of Hell shrugged, "It appears that way."

After long moment staring hard at the corrupted soul, Castiel thought of the Winchester brothers who fought so hard to save the earth from demons, angels and monsters to the end of days, stopping Apocalypse, trying to keep Purgatory away from them, taking the Leviathan down and closing the gate of Hell.

He vehemently hated the idea that someone would come here to ruin their hard work.

The angel would have given everything in his power to keep their works unspoiled. For him, he'll never walk away.

Castiel straightened his shoulder and look directly at Crowley, "I'll do it."

Crowley grinned, "Perfect." He clapped his hands together, "So . . . how we do stop it?"

"You don't." He frowned, "I'll take care of this."

The former demon's smile fell. "Hold your blasted halo, I brought you this to your attention and you're taking off my hands?"

Castiel looked crossly at Crowley, "You would only be an encumbrance to me. It's as you said, you're not demon anymore and I can take this problem faster without you."

Crowley's lips thinned, "I see you haven't taken my advice for colonblow. You haven't changed, still constipated as ever."

Something hard flitted across on Castiel face, "You should know that by now. I don't change."

A gust of the wind and a rustle of a wing was the cue of Castiel's usual disappearance without a word of parting.

"Bollocks." Crowley muttered and then shifted his gaze to the drooling mailman. "You know, if the Winchester brothers were here, they would've disagreed with him, specially the teen heartthrob."


After failing gaining result from doing the ritual to find the earthbound demons, Castiel went to the closed library, appearing front a computer and turned it on.

He sat down, waiting for the computer to boost up and he mused to himself that how ironically that he had been forced to resort to this way. Before having his grace taken by Metatron, Castiel had found research confusing and terribly tedious. He had told Dean of his opinion and Dean just grinned at him, saying:

"That's the reason I leave research to Sammy and Bobby while I do seek and destroy and maybe play around a little."

Castiel had agreed with him but after his brief stint of human's life had given him a new appreciation and perspective of this particular researching method. Although it was still terribly tedious, it was enough to test his patience that the light overhead flickered and the bulb almost exploded to shards and sparks.

It was until dawn, he found three promising cases but he wished it was bit more concrete than vague statement of the journalist's report. Castiel pinched at the bridge of his nose and consoled himself that way it was preferable than dealing with witches and almost shuddered. He understood the sentiment over Dean's hate for the witches.

Castiel supposed it was enough to start. He spread his wing and flew, starting on the East.


To his disappointment, the first two cases were fluke, normal murders caused by a spurned lover and other for a financial vendetta.

He flew again, ending a small idyllic town of Idaho, standing at the empty street and across him was a simple house that belonged to a seemingly happy Tanner family which met a gruesome untimely demise that horrified the neighboring communities, according the report.

A husband and children slaughtered in their sleep and a wife disappeared after their death, her location currently unknown. It sounded an ordinary murder except for the fact the report indicated symbols painted on the wall, drawn with their blood.

Castiel had doubted at first that it wouldn't be entirely demonic because it sounded very much like a monster' job but the angel found himself relieved he was on the right track when he smelt a rotten egg, heavy in the air, even across the street but the house was empty with presences, the demonic forces long gone.

The angel glanced around on both sides, finding nobody on sight and then flitted himself inside the house.

The smell of blood was the first thing that pervaded his senses before he saw it. In the living room, he stared at the taped outline of a human's body on a blood smeared armchair and the taped size looked big to fit children's small shape. It seemed the husband sat there, watching TV, maybe.

It was something Jimmy Novak would've done.

Guessing from the spurt of the blood, Castiel deduced the victim had been sliced open by his throat before he was stabbed to his stomach again and again. A means of communication to the other planes with goblet of blood, perhaps?

He looked at the wall and discovered red-stained dozen hieroglyphics symbols that he couldn't decipher. Castiel cocked his head to the side as he frowned; the symbols looked oddly familiar . . . almost like Word of God but it seemed an aberration of it.

Castiel walked to the hallway, glimpsing the entrance yellow-taped as crime scene at the door but his attention intent on the floor by the corner of the door. He kneeled down to touch the yellow dust with his fingers, smearing it with his thumbs.

Sulfur.

There was no doubt anymore, this deed was done by demon.

Castiel turned his head to stare at the stairwell, sensing a trace of pain and confusion of the human's emotion echoing to his grace from the bedroom above, very faint.

Then he rose and flew to the bedroom.

Twin beds were propped against the wall, the bedcovers were torn and bloody with scattered feathers and the angel grimaced in sympathy. The children had suffered far much worse than the husband. He pushed that thought away and centering his attention to the walls. The symbols looked almost the same as downstairs with few modifications.

The grace inside him sensed something. The angel let his eyes drift shut and opened from within, extending the sight beyond his body. His grace caught the spoor traces of energy easily: a faint magic wrapping around someone's soul but it was older than murder itself, months older.

He searched further, his grace reaching to a vestige of a slow descent of insanity, the dark corruption, the flash of rage and the evil act followed by a pain, then nothing . . . not until a crowd of investigators wandering around the room, sensing their aghast horror from them, not truly understanding.

He almost withdrew his grace when the faint presence of policemen was fading away but there was something that caught his attention, something that puzzled him.

Someone had been here.

A hunter, to be specific.


Crowley plunged the angel's blade to the demon's right upper thigh, piercing through his bone and muscles to the surface of the chair with a flicker of energy coming out from the wound. A loud scream escaped from the mailman.

"Could you say again?" Crowley inquired patiently, "This time slower."

The mailman was sweating profusely, his face pale and wan and he tried to spit at Crowley's face "Screw you!"

"Tsk, tsk. That's not very nice." Crowley said, "Here I am, asking politely from you and you spew insults." He grabbed another set of an angel blade from the table, taking a perverse pleasure to see the mailman's eyes flinch at the sight of the weapon, "Now, I'll ask you again and this time I'll better hear lovely sonnets from your lips just the way I like. Preferably La Traviata but you know, it can be anything. I'm not picky."

"Screw. You." The demon dragged the words.

Crowley sighed, "Wrong answer," and proceeded to stab the angel's blade through the left thigh with more force than before.

The mailman wailed loudly for a long moment then slumped forward and heaved in pain.

"Feeling like chatty Cathy now?"

A heavy gravel of a voice spoke from behind him, "Crowley."

Crowley raised his eyebrow in surprise and spun the chair around to find Castiel standing few feet from him. "My, this certainly is a surprise. I didn't think you would come back."

"Did you send a hunter?"

"Why hello, Crowley, you look lovely with this outfit." He mocked the angel, gesturing the butcher gear over his suit. "A greeting like that would be nice."

Castiel gave him the look that told him he didn't appreciate the mocking tone.

"Fine." Crowley sighed after long silence, "Care to repeat that question?"

"Did you send a hunter?" Castiel repeated flatly.

"If you'll be little more helpful with few more details, then maybe I might know what you're talking about because that was obtuse."

"While I was investigating, I discovered that I wasn't alone in that search." Castiel said impatiently, "Someone is also looking those earthbound demons."

"And that got your panties in a bunch?" Crowley asked, raising a single eyebrow. "Because I don't see the problem—you know the saying, 'the more the merrier.'"

Castiel looked at him, expressionless, "I like working alone."

"I know for a fact that your history suggest otherwise."

That statement pained him more than he thought it would and his lips thinned, "Did you send the hunter or not?"

"I don't deal with hunters anymore except Samantha and Jody." He told him, "The rest of them would've my pretty head on pike after that debacle with Campbell. So no, I haven't sent any of them."

The angel didn't seem happy of that revelation.

Crowley pushed the caster wheels of the chair with his leg to the edge of the table, "Assuming that you're asking, I reckon you found one of the demons?" Crowley grabbed scalpel with his gloved hand as he turned his head to face the angel. "Because if so, that's rather quick—"

He stopped when he saw an empty space where the angel was supposed to be.

"Peachy." He said, shrugging. To the mailman, he grinned as he raised the scalpel, "Are you up for round three?"

The mailman whimpered.

Castiel appeared to the last spoor of demonic trace, arriving at the center of a crossroad in the middle of wheat-field. Beneath him, the dirt had been dug and buried once again.

He dug with single hand, shifting the disturbed dirt aside easily until he found a box. Inside revealed the usual ritual for summoning a crossroad demon: the black cat bone, a bag of graveyard dirt and wilted yarrow flowers but it was the driving license that he found helpful. The picture on it portrayed a mid-thirties woman with the name, address on the plastic. It was the same address of the house whose family was murdered and the woman was Tanner, the very same person that had disappeared after murder of her husband and children.

It was very clear the woman was possessed—no, that didn't sound right to Castiel's mind. There was no possessions, corrupted would be more correct. But it told Castiel one thing—the earthbound demon was trying to summon a crossroad demon. However, this was not enough to bring him understanding. Why an earthbound demon would summon a crossroad demon when its soul was useless for a deal? Or it had its uses?

There was still humanity in one of them, Castiel saw himself, so it had soul or a ghost of their former self, like a brand on a soul and perhaps it was worthy enough for a crossroad demon. It would safe to assume the woman's corrupted soul was the same as the mailman, still available for sale but therein lies the problem. When they had had shut the door of hell completely, it included the crossroad demons.

Nobody had seen them for seven years and it remained true when Castiel's grace searched for any other imprint of a demonic presences and he found only one and another human's soul—a very dead one—but no crossroad demon.

Miles of tall stalks of wheat met the sky when Castiel stood up; searching for the dead human and he saw a thatched brown roof of a farmhouse rose above the stalks.

His wing stretched open and snapped inside the farmhouse quickly, rustling the papers to the air with a burst of wind preceding his existence. Castiel almost missed the old man, dead and lying on the kitchen's floor. He had died recently, for few hours, perhaps, Castiel wasn't entirely certain. With a quick survey, Castiel surmised the old man had died the same way the husband had died, its throat slit open and blood was sprayed on the yellow cabinets and the surface of the table but no blood drawn symbols anywhere.

This was done in hurry in sort detached fashion and he was not sure what to think about that. The demon's intention was a mystery at this point.

Castiel saw through the window and realized it begun to get dark, the sky shifting in lavender with orange hues, painting the clouds with golden brushes. To a human, it might have looked wonderful to witness the shifting colors but Castiel felt nothing at the beauty of sunset.

He gave one last glance at the kitchen and vanished.