AN: Sorry for the loong delay! Please forgive me! (^o*)// Enjoy this new chapter and expect another one soon..and please don't forget to leave a review or comment.

Chapter 3: One By One

Dean was pushing it, his foot heavy on the pedal as the Impala sped down the empty highway in an effort to reach the prison where Lily was being kept before Lilith reached her. Lilith, uber demon bitch was going to sacrifice Lily in an effort to gain more power and change the tide of war in her favor. But only if the Winchesters didn't get to Lily first. She was close as Castiel had explained to them when he appeared to them a short while ago.

"You found her? That was quick." Dean glanced in his rearview mirror, turning off his car and shifted in his seat so he could face Castiel. "Is she safe now cuz we--"

"We cannot reach her." Castiel interrupted from his spot next to Sam. "The demons have warded her against us." Dean looked back at Castiel, his arm over the seat, thinking that it was strange to see an angel in his car. Not that it was too strange. Anna was sat in his car too, in the exact spot Castiel was in right now.

"And that's my cue to split." Ruby shifted in her seat, ill at ease at being tied up with an angel right behind her. Sam noticed this and climbed out of the car before opening her door. "Good luck with getting the girl and all but---"

"Ruby stay. We could use your help here." Sam said as he helped her out of the car and set about to cutting the knot holding her. She slipped out of the ropes, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up as Dean and Castiel watched her.

"I would, you know I would help you out and all but you have an angel with you now. You don't need me." Ruby said, backing away from Sam. "Not yet anyways. See you around Sam."

She turned and took off for trees and was soon gone from sight.

"Ding dong." Dean said as he watched Sam sigh and head back to the car. He relaxed when Sam opened the front door and climbed in. Dean looked back at Castiel who remained where he was, silent, patient and ever watchful. "So Cas, where is the girl?"

Castiel turned his dark blue eyes to Dean. "New Haven Missouri."

"That far away?" Dean exclaimed. "But she was only taken last night!"

"You must understand. The demons will stop at nothing to get what they want from her." Castiel said, his voice grave without a hint of sympathy. He was all business. "And we will stop them before they get too far in the process."

A shock of danger went through the brothers at Castiel's tone. They've heard that tone once before, when he and his partner Uriel threaten to destroy an entire town to stop a seal from being broken. Though Dean and Sam had stopped that from happening, it wasn't before the seal was broken and a demon was released. Sam killed the demon but it created a rift between him and Dean that was slow to close.

"What do you mean stop them?" Sam asked slowly, not wanting to be mistaken. They were after all talking about a young girl. "What are you going to do?"

"There is a time limit now. Orders from high up have given the two of you 24 hours to get her back to her mother before they take matters in their own hands to keep her from falling into the wrong hands."

"So ganking her is the way to go?!" Dean said in frustration. He was angry that the angels would do that but deep down, he knew he shouldn't be surprised. "She's just a kid Cas!"

"She's too important."

"Is it because of what she is? What she can do?" Sam asked as Dean started the car and spun the car back into the road, the wheels squealing in place and the engine roaring as they headed towards Missouri.

"Yes."

"That's bullshit orders Cas and you know it!" Dean yelled over his shoulder.

"Lily Angeal must not be corrupted or sacrificed by Lilith and her followers, or the world will be lost." Castiel said, trying to catch Dean's eyes but failing to do so. He glanced over at Sam. "I trust you two will do all that you can to keep that from happening. That is all that saves her now."

"We will." Sam said with a nod. Dean didn't reply and soon Castiel was gone.

Sam turned in his seat so he was facing forward, looking over at Dean who had both hands on the steering wheel and his eyes forward. He had a look of determination on his face. "Dean--"

"We're going to save her Sam. If it's the last thing I do, we're going to save that little girl." Dean said.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Lily sat in the corner of the room, her hands throbbing painfully in her lap and waited with her eyes closed and her back against the wall. Yuffie sat next to her, posed with its round hands in its lap. She was tired and hungry and scared but determined and confident in her plan to escape to a place where she could be seen, heard and saved. She could hear the demons moving in the house and when she really listened, she could count how many there were in the house.

She was never more thankful that she was Hunter.

Well, a Hunter in training. More like a beginner student.

No, not a beginner...more like...

"Shut up Yuffie!" Lily said to her toy, glaring at it. "I know that, you don't have to rub it in my face!"

Lily sighed and sat up straighter and picked Yuffie up and held her close. "I'm sorry. I'm scared too. But Momma always said if you understand your fear, you will beat it. I know what I'm afraid of...and I think I know how to beat it. I think, I'm not really sure but I can't just sit here anymore. I have to get back to Momma. She's missing me or she might be hurt and---no I'm not going to wait. We have to leave now."

Lily nodded before reaching for the tin plate that had symbols drawn on it with her blood and stood up, taking a deep breath and headed for the door. She needed to get out of here and this might be the only chance she had. Hiding the tin plate between her and Yuffie, she grabbed the door handle and slowly, quietly pulled it open. There was a demon, possessing a tall thin man with sharp features and thinning brown hair, keeping watch in the hallway but he was sitting farther down and not paying attention like he should be.

His mistake.

She started off quietly, speaking in a hushed voice that barely carried to the demon. He rolled his neck, trying to relax the tense muscles that appeared as he unknowingly listened to the words being spoken. It sounded Latin, clear and precise and he grunted in pain as his body started jerking and tightening up on him. He could feel something was wrong but when he looked down the hall from his seat, he saw nothing that would be a threat to him.

*A mercedes diavoli libera nos domine, ut ecclesiam tuam--*

The brat hadn't made a noise all day.

*-- secura tibi facies. ibertate servire te rogamus audi nos--*

Feeling his chest tighten and having trouble breathing, he stood up and instantly fell against the wall, coughing and choking as his very essence started to flow from his mouth. Fear grabbed him when he realized that the white noise he had been ignoring was actually a Latin based exorcism being spoken by the girl who now stood in front of him, her mouth forming the words as she spoke in her normal tone.

"---sante ecclesiae te rogamos audi nos In nominis deus ... sanctuario tuus Exert tua virtute et fortitudinem levi sue benedectis deus gloria patri." she finishes and the demon screamed as his essence exited his body in a fiery display of smoke and fire into the ceiling. The body it was possessing fell forward just as Lily ran pass him as fast as she could because she just knew that she didn't have much time to escape, not with that noise and not when every demon in the house could feel the exorcism that had taken place.

She ran down the hall pass the stairs, turned around the table sitting in the foray and twisted the locks on the door leading to the front yard. She didn't make an attempt to run out of the house. She stood in the opening, breathing heavily when she saw the grey sky and the light rain falling and her stomach dropped. Her whole plan could fail. Saying a quick prayer, she grabbed the tin plate and threw it like a Frisbee before a demon bodily hauled her from the doorway and pulled her back inside the darken house.

Lily's heart pounded in her chest and she grunted when she was tossed to the ground, sliding a bit across the wood floor to the man who she just freed. She laid on her stomach, hurting and saw that the man was laying there with his green eyes open in fear and shock. She felt for him and placed her hand on his head, "Our Heavenly Father, full of grace, I absolve this man of his sins. Allow him to go in peace and give him his due."

She repeated this prayer as other demons appeared from upstairs and the living room, gathering in the foray before the demon with the peppered man stood over her. He grinned widely before he snapped his fingers and pointed down. Two demons reacted quickly, moving forward to grab the man by his legs and dragged him screaming from the hallway. Lily reached for him, brushing his fingers but failed to grab him. He was still screaming when the demon knelt down and spoke with her.

"Everything you touch," he said, staring into her honey colored eyes that were full of sorrow and yet defiant with his own soulless inky black eyes. As he spoke, he breathed on her and strangely enough it bore the hint of mint. "Will wither and die. Everything you save, one by one, will end one way..." In the other room, the man let out a painful wail before it was cut off suddenly and Lily, who had been keeping quiet this whole time by biting her lower lip cried out. "Or the other."

He chuckled and stood up. "Let that be a lesson to you. Do anything like that again, and I'll grab a child off the street." The humor disappeared from his face. "Get up."

Lily slowly climbed to her feet, her eyes on the ground and her head down. "Look at me."

She held Yuffie tight in her arms and slowly raised her head up so that he could see that she was shaken. That was good. Her spirit needed to be broken. It was going to be his gift to Lilith when she got here.

"You've been a bad little girl. You killed that man." he tsked, putting his gloved hand under her chin, holding her in place with his fingers.

"I'm not. I didn't---you---you killed him. You didn't have to but you did." Lily said, her voice shaky as she spoke. "He may not have been a nice man before but he didn't deserve what happened to him. And--and I won't allow you to get away with this."

"You won't allow? Who are you to allow anything you little brat!?" he thrust her away from him in anger and sneered at her.

Lily tilted her chin up and stepped forward. "I'm Lily Angeal and I have Heaven on my side. And Heaven isn't very happy with you."

"Isn't happy?!" the demon sneered in disgust and reached to grab her when he saw something drip to the ground. He grabbed her hand and saw that her hands had tore open from their scabs, dripping a blood trail from where she stood to the doorway and quite possibly outside, pass the wards. And blood, he knew for a fact, was very important to the Heavenly bodies.

The house started to shake and rattle as a loud deafening ringing assaulted their ears, bringing a great many of the demons to their knees in pain, their hands pressed to their ears in an effort to block out the noise that seemed to come from everywhere at once, even vibrating inside their own bodies. Lily on the other hand, was unaffected in the noise frozen as the noise grew louder with her eyes closed and trembling. Finally she opened her eyes and looked to the windows as if seeing someone call for her. A second passed by before she slowly made her way back to the room as a bright blinding light appeared from outside.

She closed the door and walked to the middle of the room before sitting down with her knees drawn up to her chest; Yuffie nestled safely in her embrace and started praying. "Our Heavenly Father, full of grace, I absolve them of their sins. Give them their due. Our Heavenly Father, full of grace, I absolve them of their sins. Give them their due. Our Heavenly Father---"

She leaned her forehead against her knees and closed her eyes.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Just outside the city limits of New Haven Missouri, Dean and Sam skidded to a stop as they watched in shocked awe as the dark grey sky opened up, the clouds billowing downward like the beginning of a tornado but opened to reveal a bright white light, ever expanding outward until it swallowed the town.

Sam clutched the dashboard, thinking that they failed to save the town and its people and most of all, the little girl they had came to rescue. Dean cursed out loud with every known curse he knew, angered that Heaven and its soldiers didn't give them enough time as the white light enveloped them.