Chapter 2: By a Moonlit Shadow
"Sammy!"
The creature had been charging directly for him and his name was all he remembered hearing before something tackled him from the side and sent him crashing to the floor. At first he thought it had been the creature that had knocked him for six, but then he realised that whatever had barrelled into him had actually shunted him out of the way. There could only be one person reckless and selfless and stupid enough to jump in front of a charging monster just to save him.
Ignoring the sharp pain that shot along his spine, Sam lifted his head and looked down the length of his body just in time to see the creature lifting Dean up by the neck.
A shaft of moonlight, escaping from the cloudy sky outside, shone in through one of the broken windows overlooking the warehouse section of the mill, briefly illuminating the scene. Lying prone on the warehouse floor in the creature's moonlit shadow, Sam saw it clearly for the first time.
The vague descriptions and limited engravings they'd managed to collate hadn't prepared them for what they were facing. The creature was big, bigger than they had anticipated, and while it was fairly humanoid it wasn't sentient in any way that they could reason with. They'd known coming into this that bullets would have no lethal affect but they'd hoped nonetheless that a few rounds may slow it down at least. They'd been wrong. While Sam was sure that every shot had hit its mark, it had made no difference. There was no blood, at least none that had been visible, and any wounds the creature may have sustained were simply lost and absorbed and ignored in the contours of its flesh and bones.
It stood tall on limbs contorted like the hind legs of a cat or a dog, and was easily three or four feet taller even than Sam. The head was comparatively small, but Sam couldn't get a clear impression other than a blur of sharp looking teeth that flashed white in the moonlight. There was no fat or tufts of fur hiding its form, and its sinewy muscles and tendons were visible all over its body, the skin stretched so taught and translucent over its flesh that it glistened, looking almost as though it had been skinned. Its powerful arms, much like its legs, seemed longer than they should have been and they tapered into large claws with viciously sharp looking talons.
Claws and talons that were right at that moment, wrapped around Dean's neck.
Sam could see Dean struggling to raise his shotgun again as the creature brought him close to its face and towards those multitude of deadly teeth. For an awful moment Sam thought it was going to bite Dean's head off. But it seemed almost as if the creature were… scrutinising Dean, peering into his face for some unknown reason. But just as Sam was trying to understand what might be happening, there was a piercing bright light, and the next thing he saw was Deans limp body crumpling to the floor as the creature let him go. Sam didn't know what had happened in those few seconds but there was nothing good that could result in Dean being out for the count like that. Had the creature snapped Dean's neck? The thought made him sick. But worse, horrified and stunned by what he had just witnessed, for an instant it froze Sam in place.
The creature however was suffering from no such emotional lapse, and with Dean seemingly taken care of, its attention was now fixed firmly on Sam.
The sudden realisation that he had only a few seconds before the creature would be upon him jolted Sam back to reality. He realised that somehow his hands had pulled out the small roughly tied pouch from his pocket, and without even giving it a second thought, he threw it at the creature, shouting out the incantation and praying he had memorised it correctly.
The creature was in mid-lunge when the pouch hit it square in the chest and as soon as it did, the creature fell like a dead weight to the floor, its head almost crashing onto Sam's legs. Sam scrambled up, a second pouch again already in his hand and the incantation flowing from his lips. He threw it as he enunciated the last syllable of the spell and the creature became engulfed in a haze of murky green mist. That was it, the trapping spell, and it seemed it had worked.
At any rate, the creature seemed immobile for the time being. Sam rushed over to where Dean lay motionless and tried to lift him up to a seating position.
"Dean! Dean!" His fingers traced the line of his neck desperately searching for a pulse.
It was weak but it was there and Sam almost wept with relief, and in that same momentarily relief he felt a quick flash of anger blaze through him at the thought that his brother felt the need to sacrifice his own safety in the belief that Sam needed rescuing. That Sam couldn't handle himself.
The anger however, like the relief, was short lived, as Sam realised there was something deeply wrong with how unresponsive and limp Dean's body felt.
Carefully cradling him with one arm, he tried to hold his brother's head with his free hand, only to have it loll lifelessly from one side to the other, and all relief evaporated from him as quickly as it had settled. His panic was rising and he slapped Dean across the face.
Nothing.
"Hey! Hey, Dean come on."
He slapped him again, harder, as hard as he dared.
Nothing. Dean's head rolled to the side again and that was when Sam saw it.
Dull, blue marks, almost like bruises but glowing slightly. Identical to the other victims, except these were more pronounced and livid.
No, no, no! This wasn't supposed to happen. How could this happen? The creature wasn't supposed to be able to do this. How could this have happened?
He didn't even realise he'd done it but a wordless prayer must have escaped him somehow, because there was a slight rush of air and in the next instant, Castiel was by his side.
"Sam. What's happened?" The angel had finished surveying the scene before he had even finished asking the question, and didn't need an answer. He knelt down beside Sam and touched Dean's forehead.
"He's alive, but he's out cold." Sam explained, the words tumbling out from him, not questioning how or why Cas was there, just grateful that he was. There would be nothing to worry about now that the angel would heal Dean. He tried to let that knowledge seep into him, tried to let it calm him. "And he's been infected by that thing. But I'm pretty sure that's not possible, except…" Sam trailed off, looking to the angel with a mixture of confusion and disbelief when Cas moved his hand away and Dean didn't instantly wake up.
"I know these creatures." Cas said, straightening up and moving closer to inspect the fallen monster. "They're old world beings, from the time of creation. I didn't know any of them were still here, I thought they had all been banished…. You've trapped it in a spell?"
"We needed to buy time." Sam explained impatiently. "Look Cas, just heal Dean and we'll fill you in."
"No Sam, you don't understand." He said, returning to Sam's side. "I can't. These creatures, these Darona-Khabs, their power is ancient. And it stretches across time."
Sam tried to take this in, tried to understand what it meant. "What are you saying Cas? That Dean… Dean's just gonna be in a coma like the other victims?" That would be okay, he quietly, immediately, consoled himself. It wasn't ideal, but it was okay. They could work with that. Dean had a head start over the other victim, and they had the creature trapped, so all they had to do was wait.
"There are other victims?" Cas asked, breaking Sam's reverie, but then shook his head as if to negate the question before Sam could respond. "It doesn't matter. You're right, Dean's been infected, but I suspect not like the others. Darona-Khabs don't normally physically infect their prey. The only way to heal someone who's been infected as severely as Dean is to intervene when they were first infected."
"When they were… You mean Dean was attacked before today? ... OK…. Okay so you can travel back in time, go back and do that. Intervene."
"I can't."
"Why not!?"
"Because I'm the only thing keeping Dean alive right now."
Sam blinked, the words taking a minute to seep in. "What?"
"Darona-Khabs attack their victims twice. Once when the victim is young, then again when they're adults. But in any normal case, a victim is ordinarily only attacked in his or her sleep. Dean on the other hand has been attacked physically, in the real world. That's made the attack more powerful, more potent. Even though you've trapped the Darona-Khab, Dean's infection is still severe. I can't repair him, I can only keep him alive, slow the rate of demise. If I leave now and travel back in time, even for a split second, Dean will die."
Sam's mind raced, taking in what the angel was telling him and trying to formulate it into something he could process.
"Okay. OK. So you keep Dean safe here, and send me back instead to whenever it was he was first attacked." His mind flashed the entry from their father's journal. Too much of a coincidence. "I can tell you the rough time and exact place. I'll kill it before it can ever get to Dean."
But Cas was already shaking his head. "It takes too much energy to send someone back through time. If I sent you, I'd risk losing my hold on Dean. Besides, the fact that Dean is here, like this, means that nothing ever stopped him being attacked in the first place."
"So… what are you telling me Cas? What do we do?"
Cas knelt down, brow knitted in thought and placed his hand on Deans forehead again. He was quiet for a long time, as though thinking something through, and Sam, despite his desire to grab the angel by the collar and shake an answer from him, waited.
"Is Dean the latest victim?" Cas asked, staring at the prone form of the creature, then turning his attention back to Dean. Sam nodded.
"There might be one thing we could try," The angel said finally, "But I don't know if it would work."
"What?"
"These creatures exist outside of conventional constraints in time as you humans might understand them. They only start feeding once they've attached to a victim at both ends of what you could think of as a temporal loop or cycle. A beginning and an end. Right now, it's tied to Dean. This is the latest loop and both Dean and the creature are in it. But because of the spell you've bound the creature in, it can't escape. It will stay trapped in this loop, until either the spell wears off or… until Dean dies."
"Neither of those are good options Cas." Sam interjected barely able to contain his impatience, only to be met with the angel's annoyance.
"What I'm saying is, we might be able to use this to our advantage. We know which loop it's trapped in right now. This is a good thing. I can begin the ritual to break the cycle, to break its hold on Dean, but it would only be at this end of the loop. In order for it to work, it would need to be broken at both ends of the same loop."
"You mean at the time when Dean was first infected. But you said you can't send me back."
"I can't, I mean not physically… But I could perhaps send your consciousness back. It would mean your body would remain here, but you would be projected back in time. I have no idea if it would even work–"
"OK let's do it. What do you need me to do when I get there?"
"Sam you don't understand. You would only be projected into the past. You, this version of you, wouldn't physically be there. I don't even know if there's anything you could do except be an observer. Your younger self may be able to sense or perceive you but… I just don't know. You'd have to figure out a way to intervene, somehow, to save Dean, without actually being able to physically do anything."
"Well what else is there Cas? Unless we wait two months for some sacrificial goat's blood…"
"Dean doesn't have that long." Cas said quietly, not able to keep a pained expression from marring his features as he looked at the limp form of his friend in the younger brother's arms. "I've slowed down what's happening to him, but not for that long."
Sam swallowed down on the lump that had formed in his throat.
"Okay then send me back. I'll figure it out."
"Are you sure about this?" Cas asked, looking doubtful.
"We don't have any other options do we?"
Cas shook his head, sadness clouding his features again briefly, before his face took on a more resolute expression.
"All right", He acquiesced. "But there's a few things you need to know. These creatures feed in order to maintain a non-corporeal form. When their energy runs out they're forced to manifest physically. They need to feed again in order to recharge their energy and reassume their non-corporeal existence. That's usually at the end of a cycle, like here, which is why it's a physical being that you and Dean managed to trap. What I mean is, the chances are it won't exist as a physical creature for you to hunt when you go back, at the start of the feeding cycle. Whenever Dean was infected, it was in his dreams, his nightmares, not in the real or physical world. That means you'll have to find a way to make Dean confront the Darona-Khab in his dreams, and bind it there. You won't be able to do it for him, because it won't physically exist. Dean is the only one who can do it, because Dean is the only one who would actually be there and the only place it will be lurking at that time, is in Dean's mind, in his dreams."
"Cas… Damn it Cas, if I'm right about when Dean got infected, then he was just a kid. Not even 10 years old. How am I supposed to get him to fight a monster in his dreams?"
Cas shook his head. "I don't know Sam. I'm sorry. It's all I can think of."
Sam bit down his anger, instantly regretting his tone. If it wasn't for Cas there would be no hope. "I'm sorry Cas." Sam remedied. "None of this is your fault. Here," He said shifting Dean's weight. "Take him. I'll figure out a way. Just keep him alive."
"I've never separated a human's consciousness like this before Sam, let alone sent it across time." The angel admitted, looking doubtful and almost fearful as he repositioned himself to take over responsibility for Dean. "It's different to when you dream, or when we angels make you dream. I have no idea what you can expect or what, if anything, you'll be able to do. Human consciousness is… complex. It's more than just brainwaves. It's entwined with your souls. Your emotions. And it's tethered to a body, to a physical thing. Being untethered like this… I'm not sure what effect it will have. It may make your emotions, your latent anxieties, more apparent. Perhaps even magnify them to an extent."
"All right." Sam said, not sure what to do with that information, his attention focussed more on ensuring Dean's head was cradled and safe, before he nodded at the angel.
"What I'm doing," Cas continued, "is detaching you, separating you from your body, from the thing that contains and anchors you. But that's all I'm doing Sam. It might be all I can do. I can't direct you, I'm just a springboard, I'll propel you, but you're the one who'll need to take control somehow. You'll just be adrift unless you can find a way to navigate and get to Dean yourself. And even then, as I said, I just don't know if anyone would even perceive you. Unless someone is gifted or is deeply attached to a particular soul, an arbitrary untethered consciousness' outside of their own is difficult for humans to detect. Sam, I–"
"It's okay Cas. I'll figure it out." Sam cut him off, understanding the angels concern and trying to reassure him. "Just tell me what I need to do." And then he corrected himself. "What I need to get Dean to do."
The angel regarded him briefly before nodding. "All right. The ritual is an Enochian spell. Dean will need to repeat it when he confronts the creature in his dream. He'll need to be close enough for the Darona-Khab to hear him. I don't know how it will manifest for Dean, what it will look like; it could be in its actual form or it might take the guise of someone or something else. All I can tell you is that it will be in a nightmare, it can't exist in a normal dream. And it will use Dean's fears, Dean's nightmare's, against him."
Sam nodded, trying to take it all in. Despite the angel's apologies this was more information than Sam or Dean's own research had been able to supply, so he was grateful for it. Castiel continued, his voice as always managing to sound patient and urgent all at once.
"I'll embed the spell in your mind so that you know it. Humans usually wake up, or get woken up from nightmares, so it can take several dreams before the creatures fully latches on. That means Dean will have more than one chance to bind it. But once a Darona-Khab has latched onto him fully, then it won't appear again and there will be nothing we can do."
"Don't worry." Sam tried to reassure him. "I'll make sure we get it."
Cas nodded, apparently satisfied. "Lie down, close your eyes." he instructed. "Are you ready? Do you know when you need to go to?" Sam nodded, closing his eyes. "Focus on that date. Focus on finding Dean at that date. Take control and find your way. Focus yourself completely to that… Focus on the date… Focus on Dean… Focus."
For the briefest instant, Sam felt Cas' light touch on his forehead and a searing bright light seemed to engulf him, but before he could register anything more, everything went dark.
