"Remember when I came back from break all messed up — dropped out of pre-med, the drugs, the bitches? That was the new Brady. That was me. Remember how much time you spent trying to get me back on the right track? You really were a good friend." -The Demon Brady 5.20 The Devil You Know
The problem with Demons working together is the tendency to want to backstab one another to get ahead in whatever scheme they were planning. Team work never seemed to go very well when everyone had their own angle. Still, if there was a common goal in mind, it was easy enough to find loyal men to fill the ranks. Azazel chose one of those to infiltrate Tyson Brady.
Tyson would be so easy to use, really. The blue-blooded sack of shit was already falling apart under pressure. Sammy wouldn't suspect a damn thing if he started acting oddly.
No one would question his startling changes in behavior. College kids ended up on drugs all the time, because they apparently find it so much pressure to study and show up to fucking class twice a week. Brady would just be another casualty. Shame, really. Such a bright young man.
Such a promising future.
And given Sam's pathetic boy scout conscientious nature, he was guaranteed to try and save Brady from himself. The Winchesters loved to do that. Save people. And Sam especially had a pull to want to save people from themselves. At least his fucking brother and father were smart enough to focus on a physical out come. They had the pay off of kill the monster, save the girl. Sam wanted to heal and mend and offer supporting shoulders to people...at least until it became obvious that it was futile. Then he would finally pull away out of self-preservation before the other person dragged him down with him. Like he'd done with his family.
It would make Sam so sad to fail at putting Brady back on the right path. It would make him so unhappy and powerless, like he'd been before he'd taken charge of his own life, told his father to fuck off, and gone off to college.
Somewhere deep down in his distorted soul, Azazel was happy.
Sam smiled as Brady knocked in his dorm room door and let himself in. Brady was wearing his loafers and a crisp Polo shirt, his hair combed back with styling gel. He looked markedly better than last time they'd been together.
"Hey Sam," the voice was jovial. "How was vacation? Or your idea of it?"
"Good." Sam said, standing up from his banged up little writing desk. A curbside find. It was close to a genuine antique, which meant that it was as solid as they come. It also meant that the chair was several sizes too small for Sam's tall ans still lanky frame, but most things were, and he knew how to make do. Sam had rescued it off a curb at the start of his school career and it had followed him since then.
He'd arduously carried it back to his room, cleaned it, glued what was rickety back together, and despite the wear and dents, he had a nice solid desk. It always amazed him what people threw away. What ended up in land fills on a whim. Good serviceable things that had just become old or out of style.
Sam took Brady's hand, pulled him into a rough hug and thumped him on the back. "You look good, man. You had me worried about you for a minute."
"Me?" Brady said breezily, "Nah."
Sam's forehead wrinkled. "You sure? You can talk to me, man. It's just us here."
"You know I..." Brady shifted with a smile and squared his shoulders. "I was just really stressed over school and family but I sort of came to an epiphany."
"Which is...?" Sam dragged out the syllables.
"Fuck 'em both."
Sam snorted with an uncomfortable smile. "Yeah... it's not always that simple though, is it?"
"Sure it is." Brady circled around him and straddled the antique chair and settled in. "My family...I don't need the stress, I gotta do what makes me happy, you know?"
"Yeah." Sam replied with the same unsure flash of teeth. "I've been telling you that for years. You always put so much pressure on yourself to-"
"So I told my father to bite me and rolled out of there." Brady traced his finger over the top of the curved wooden chair, an ornate swirl in the wood, crafted no doubt back before things were mass manufactured.
Sam's eyes widened. "You what?"
"He was on me about my grades...about making it through and staying on target, graduating when I was supposed to...blah, blah blah, I was done with his shit. I got to thinking maybe I don't want to be a doctor. I mean he's pushing me into it."
"But...but you love medicine."
"Other things to love about it besides working with patients, Sam. I was thinking research science. Pharmaceuticals. Hands on stuff. What do you think?"
Sam blinked, baffled by the change in behavior. "I..." he paused. "I mean it's good that you're not letting them stress you and push you, Brady, but I mean think about this. Really think about it. You're several years into pre-med. That's...that's a lot of work to switch tracks with. And I know your family is stressful sometimes but I mean," he huffed, "all families are. They care about you. You can't just throw them away."
Brady raised an eyebrow. Hos look of disapproval was almost feral. "Really, Sam? You're going to tell me that?"
Sam felt the jibe hit it's mark. His face tightened a little, a painful lump in his throat before he managed to swallow. "My family is dysfunctionally dangerous. It's... It's a different story altogether." Sam's jaw jumped a little. "And I didn't throw them away. They threw me away."
A flash of Dad's deep baritone. If you leave, don't you ever come back.
John Winchester was a man of his word. There would be no going back. And when push came to shove, his brother had sided with their father. With what he saw as his duty and his legacy.
Sam could feel his heart give a decidedly strong thump in his chest. Could feel it speeding up, aided with adrenaline, his respiration quickening. He wasn't usually even aware of the amount of hurt and betrayal and abandonment boiling just below the surface, until something external scraped it on accident. Then it surprised him with its intensity, like a paper cut rubbed the wrong way.
Sam liked to qualify his emotions with logic but this...well, this he doubted he would ever be over entirely.
Brady was watching his reaction with an almost measured distance that bordered on making Sam uncomfortable.
"You're right." Completely different, he acquiesced.
"And cutting them off. That's...you'll have to support yourself, man. Make your own way. Believe me, it's not always easy. It's a lot of work and..."
"Okay, Sam, I get it." Brady cut in, almost impatiently. "Hey. I am going to a party tonight. You wanna come?"
Sam felt himself shrink back uncomfortably. He turned his head. "You know I'm no good at parties."
"Come on." Brady rapped his knuckles on the wooden chair back a few times. "Live a little. Get away from this Two-Dollar-Little-House-on-the-Prairie Writing Desk and come have a drink with your buddies. If it's lame we can all dodge out the back door and go grab something to eat."
"All?"
"Zach and Rebecca are coming too. Come on." Brady stood up and shoved the chair noisily across the wooden dorm room floor.
Sam could see it scuff the old laminate. He winced. "Careful don't scrape the floor."
"Are you shitting me? Like these bastards can't afford to refinish the floors once a freaking decade. They'll probably cover em up with crappy carpet someday anyway."
Sam's brow furrowed, a little thrown by Brady's change of behavior. "Brady what are you on?"
"Nothing buddy." He seemed taller than he usually did. More confident, a big broad shouldered, chisel-jawed athlete of a man. Someone that belonged in a frat playing beer pong. "I'm on LIFE, man. You should try it."
He clapped Sam roughly on the back.
Sam fought the unease in his stomach. He wasn't comfortable with Brady's new found attitude...at all.
Tyson Brady was a weird fit at first. It had been so long since the demon had tried on a meatsuit. As meatsuits went, this one was pretty nice. The kid was athletic, good looking, charming, rich. It was a welcome assignment.
Tyson had been so easy to possess. No fight at all. The kid was too damn tired and stressed. When The Demon first entered Brady's mind, set up shop and took a look around, he almost laughed at Brady's worries.
Were his grades good enough? Would his parents be angry? Petty moral dilemmas. Was he nice enough to the girl friend he'd broken up with a few months ago? Was it his fault the relationship didn't work out?
The boy had guilt over angry words or skipped assignments or petty lies. All this inconsequential human baggage inside this soft mind. No steel in this kid's spine at all. He was so fucking wishy washy. So afraid of offending or doing the wrong thing.
Pathetic. Fucking Pathetic.
The Demon let Brady have the reins here and there. He let Brady know there was something wrong with him. Pushed the kid's consciousness out of the way but made sure that it was not so thorough a job that the kid wasn't aware something was wrong with himself. Then, when he'd given Brady control of his own body again, the kid had come back to consciousness with a rush of sheer panic.
He called Sam and cried while The Demon sat back and observed his distress with detached amusement. The Demon tested the waters, taking over the kid's thoughts for a moment. Fencing with Sam on the phone, then hanging up. He'd told Brady's parents to fuck off and left home early.
Then, he took the new body for a spin. He'd taken his time, weaved his way back to Stanford slowly. Taking the opportunity to smell the roses, to indulge in some reckless drinking and driving. He scored a few drugs on his way back to school and took Brady's body for a test ride with a cheap hooker.
It was good to be back topside. So good to feel the adrenaline and life force surging in his veins again, singing to him with its sheer intensity. To feel the heady feeling of sex and power. And all the while to feel Tyson's loud distress in the back of his mind as he watched with horror, imprisoned in his own psyche horrified by the behavior and foreign thoughts running through his brain.
That was just the fucking cherry on the sundae.
The demon would never let the boy know that he was possessed. He'd play his cards carefully. Taking over when he felt like it, which to be honest was probably most of the time, maybe letting Brady have the reins now and again just for fun because nothing felt quite so pleasurable as the distress and anxiety and angst that came pouring off a body you inhabited when they knew something was wrong.
It had been too long since The Demon had felt real enjoyment...dare he even say...fun.
Author's note: I started this a while ago when season 12 started and sat back to watch the writers wreck canon and screw over plot lines from the Kripke Seasons. As such, this follows purely 1-5 canon. Sam is the ONLY true vessel of Lucifer. The ONLY one who can contain him, regardless of magic and meddling and Crowley or Rowena or Harry Potter spells or whatever else the writers come up with. Just a heads up as I progress, that this is 1-5 canon compliant. I refuse to acknowledge the mess they've made this season pandering to fan girls. Thanks guys, drop me a review if you like.