"Let me take a look at the floor plan," John asked.
They could not just barge in there without a plan.
"Yeah, here," Sam placed the paper on the car, in front of John.
John studied the hurriedly-drawn lines. Sam managed to capture all the essential details needed for a mission like this. He had obviously been trained and taught well. Mary too, and John was still not used to seeing her with a loaded shotgun sitting in her hands.
He should have been the one to protect them. Mary should never have to deal with this on her own.
"Maybe we should split up and draw them apart from each other, deal with each demon separately," Sam pointed to the spot where their enemies were situated.
"That's too risky. See, there's a backroom here. There may be more of them hidden in there. We'll be outnumbered if we split up. I say we stay together, close off all but one exit, and flush all of them out. This way we won't be outflanked or cornered," John was glad that marine skills were still sharp, even after years of living in the suburbs.
John looked up at Sam when he did not hear any replies. Sam was looking at him with a look of surprise and admiration. It was the look that Dean would give him when Dean was younger, like John was some kind of superhero.
John was hit with a pang of guilt. Sam grew up without his father by his side. Sure, Mary was an excellent mother, without a doubt. But things are just not the same without a male figure to look up to. John knew how it was like, as his own mother had raised him by herself after his father bailed.
"Yeah. That's right, we should," Sam finally said.
"Yeah John," Mary voiced her agreement and added, "We paint these sigils and devil traps at the doors and windows. When they're trapped, we can go in and get Dean."
John was still not convinced that what Mary told him was true, that demons were real. He would have to see it with his own eyes to believe it.
"And the guns would kill them?" John held up the weapon that Mary handed him.
"It won't, but it will slow them down, buy us a second or two, enough to get out. The rounds are filled with rock salt. Holy water would work too. Here, take this," Mary gave John a bottle of the blessed liquid.
"No."
John and Mary turned their heads when their youngest interrupted.
"You should have seen what they did to Dean, mom. I should send them back to hell. I want to send them back to hell," Sam was livid.
John was pleasantly surprised to find that Sam was so much like him and Dean, always so stubbornly protective over family.
"Okay then. We'll send these jerks back downstairs," Mary nodded.
"Angels are watching over you."
It was what his mother would say, when she put him to sleep at night. Dean still remembered, even if he was no more than four when she died.
"Yeah, I bet my ass they are, mom," Dean muttered under his breath.
He was not a religious man. Dean had seen too much injustice and evil in his line of work. When he was young, his dad used to tell him stories about the war that he had fought in. Dean did not want to believe that there was a higher power, which could stop all these pain and suffering, but had not even bothered to. Good people had died, he had watched his fellow colleagues got killed, while the bad guys got away with it. How could God, if there was one, let these things happen?
But here he was, tied to a chair and covered in his own blood, Dean prayed for someone to come. Not an angel or some divine being. He would settle for just some back-up and an ambulance, or he was going to bleed to death in this dump.
Dean jerked when he heard a loud clang coming from outside the door.
"Go check it out," Not-Max ordered.
With a few quick strides, Lydia opened the door and stepped outside. What she saw made her grin widely. She tried to step away from the door, but she could not, like she was rooted to the spot.
Huh. That was weird.
Someone started reciting in a language that he did not recognize. Sounded like…Latin? Lydia was on the ground, screaming and clawing desperately at the rough surface.
What the hell…
Not-Max was suddenly in front of Dean, holding a metal bowl decorated with carvings in one hand and a bowie knife in another.
"Guess that he'll have to make do with three of them," he shrugged.
"Please, stop. Max. Please. You don't have to do this," Dean cringed at the thought of more slicing.
"Don't worry, this time, it'll be quick."
Dean squeezed his eyes shut as Not-Max closed in on him, the sharp edge aiming for Dean's neck. He braced himself for the pain that never came. There was a scuffling sound, a muffled groan, and a resounding crash as the metal bowl hit the ground.
Dean opened his eyes to see his father tackling Not-Max on the ground.
Dad! What the hell was he doing here?
After they had drawn up the devils trap outside each door and under every window, Mary used her shirt to wipe the chalk off her hands. John and Mary were hunkered down under a broken window, while Sam went around to the front door.
When they heard the din over at where Sam was, the both of them took their cue and stood up. John leaped through the window immediately when he saw what the demon was about to do. He sprinted and wrestled the demon onto the ground. Mary hung back with the shotgun in her hands, ready to cover all of them if more demons showed up.
An ear-piercing scream and the silence that followed indicated that Sam had finished the exorcism. Mary waited for a few seconds, before deciding that no more demons were coming to the party and ran towards John and the other demon. They were still a tangled heap on the ground, while Dean was slumped in the chair with his head hanging limply in front of his chest.
Mary cocked her gun and waited for an opening while John emptied his bottle of holy water down the demon's throat.
"Stay away from my son, you bastard!" John grunted as he continued to pin the demon down.
Sam was at her side in a second, "I got it here mom, go get Dean."
"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas..." Sam began as Mary moved towards her other son.
"Dean? Hey, Dean? Wake up," Mary lifted his head tenderly but got no response in return.
"No, no, no. " Mary hoped that they were not too late, and was more than relieved to find him still breathing.
"Hey, open your eyes for me, Dean."
"Ergo draco maledicte, et omnis legio diabolica adjuramus te..." Sam emptied his own supply of salt and holy water onto the demon.
With a loud roar, the demon poured out of the man's mouth and fled through the broken window, only to be trapped inside one of the devil traps.
"Ut Ecclesiam tuam secura tibi facias libertate servire, te rogamus, audi nos!" Sam finished reciting.
He watched with contention as the black mass glowed red and burned until nothing was left. Sam relaxed fractionally and savored the peaceful silence for a second before his mother's voice brought him back to the present.
"No, John. What are you doing?"
Sam swiveled around to face his parents. Mary snatched John's phone from his hands.
"Not the county hospital. We can't stay here. There may be more demons around," Mary explained while she cut the ropes loose, "We'll bring him to the hospital in the next town. I'll go get the car."
"What about Max and the girl?" John took over the cutting shakily while Mary hurried out of the building.
"They're still alive. They'll be fine. We better hurry," Sam urged.
When all the ropes came loose, Dean was still unresponsive. John caught Dean, slid one arm behind Dean's back and the other beneath his legs. With a grunt, John lifted him from the chair and they made their way outside. While John got Dean into the car, Sam gave the place a quick once over to make sure that they did not leave any traces. He paused when he thought about not leaving anything behind.
"Sam? What are you waiting for?" Mary beckoned.
"I should go back and get Dean's car. I'll be right behind," Sam jingled the bunch of keys he had found earlier.
"Be careful, Sam," Mary gave a curt nod.
Dean's car was still sitting where Sam had found it. Thank god!
Sam ran his hand across the smooth, waxed top of the car. Sam could see that Dean had taken real good care of it, and he was sure that Dean would not want to leave it behind. After his bag landed onto the backseat with a soft thud, Sam climbed into the driver's seat. Once he turned the key in the ignition, the small space was filled with a Led Zeppelin tune at an uncomfortably loud volume. Classic rock station? Sam remembered that his mother had told him about how that was the only genre that his father ever listened to.
Sam looked around himself. A pair of sunglasses was sitting on the dashboard, atop of a few papers which were branded with the police department's logo. Dean's half-eaten burger and pie lay forgotten on the passenger seat, the dessert already melted into a mush of white and brown. Sam proceeded to look through the contents of the glove compartment. There were tickets for a baseball match next week, a spare gun, more papers, and a photograph of Dean and John in a bar.
Sam's lips curved upwards into a small smile. It was like putting together the bits and pieces of a complicated puzzle which was his brother, a brother that did not have the chance to know. Sam prayed that he would still have the opportunity to know Dean better, know what it would feel like to have a big brother.
"You better be okay, Dean."
He bent down and picked up the knife, which was covered with Dean Winchester's blood. With precision, he glided the blade through the throats of the two survivors in the warehouse. After which, he cleaned the blade with his coat.
He had to do the dirty jobs himself now? He needed new minions.
Azazel felt movement behind him. Without turning around, he asked, "How'd it go?"
"We found them alright," the man answered, "we took care of the guy."
Azazel sighed. Satelles was a helpful one, too bad he had brains made of mush and made all the wrong choices. Did he think that Azazel would not find out about the little plan of his? At least the female had enough sense to tell him about their stupid plan. If Azazel had not intervened, if he had not given the lady this knife to play with, the Winchesters would have gotten the slip again.
"So what do we do now sir? How do we find the Winchesters?"
"Oh...that's the sweetest part. I don't need to find them. They'll come to me when it's time," Azazel smiled at his own reflection on the cleaned blade.
He slipped the knife, his knife actually, into his coat.
"Now we wait."
The Next chapter: The Winchester reunites.
Intuition struck, and I'm almost done with the next chapter, which will probably be up by tomorrow!
A little bit of Harry Potter vibe at the end there...ah, it was not intentional at all. But hey, since I'm at it, here's a little hint about what's going to happen later in this story:
"He does not need finding. Potter will come to me. I knew his weakness you see, his one great flaw. He will hate watching the others struck down around him, knowing that it is for him that it happens. He will want to stop it at any cost. He will come." -Voldemort (Quoted from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows)
-Kelsie