Chapter Eleven: Yup, Definitely a Job for a Gryffindor

"Well, well, well."

Christine's stomach churned as she scrambled to get up and away from the three students. Despite her best efforts, a hand grabbed her shirt collar and forced her against a nearby tree.

"What do we have here?"

Lucifer moved his grasp to her throat, examining her face with wicked delight.

"Wow, what's this? The second time you've been an annoyance to me? Give me one good reason why I shouldn't just kill you now."

His grip tightened, Christine's hands were desperately clawing at his iron fist, trying to give herself some room to breathe.

"Lucifer..." Gabriel warned him, "Think a little."

"Think what, goody-two-shoes?" Lucifer maintained eye contact with her, seeming to take a terrifying joy in her suffering.

"We can't kill her, someone else was with her and they'll be able to pin the blame on us. Even if she heard it all, she's got no proof."

Lucifer held his grasp, obviously mulling over Gabriel's suggestion in his mind. Finally, he shrugged and loosened his death grip. Christine bent over gasping and wheezing, trying to fill her lungs back up. The harsh night air was less than comforting as she forced it down her throat; it felt as if her beating heart was in the way, not allowing any oxygen to come to her rescue. It was horrifyingly similar to drowning. She could feel her heart rate running faster than an Olympic sprinter – as if any minute now it would burst out of her chest. Hot tears were forming in the corners of her bleary eyes but what little pride she had left gave her the strength to hold them there. Gabriel placed his hand on Lucifer's shoulder, giving a sign to back off. This time the threatening face in front of her was Gabriel's, but there was no sickening joy in his eyes, in fact, he looked rather tired of the whole affair.

"So, you're going to tell me who was with you," he began, "or I'll punch you, deal?"

Christine couldn't formulate any coherent words, only a nearly inaudible squeak.

"Y'know, I really don't like hitting girls."

She could see in his eyes that he was pleading with her – he didn't want to hurt her. She knew that if it was up to him she would be walking free, but Lucifer wasn't going to have that. Better Gabriel doing the damage than someone who really wanted to hurt her.

"I prefer hitting on girls, completely different," he continued, still pleading with his eyes, "whoever it is certainly isn't worth protecting, they left you alone with three guys who were just casually discussing murder."

People say there are two reactions to dangerous circumstances, fight or flight. Christine disagreed because her reaction was to freeze, so she remained frozen, and subsequently silent. She agreed with Gabriel, at that moment she hated Sherlock with a burning passion, how could he leave her? If she could have, Christine would have told them the name at once. Lucifer was fidgeting impatiently behind Gabriel.

"You're too soft," Lucifer shoved Gabriel to the side, "she's not going to talk without a little help."

He grabbed Christine by the neck, hoisted her up, and landed a punch right on her nose.

Her ears began ringing, at first she was dazed, so the pain wasn't as bad, but as she slowly began to refocus she could feel the sickening sensation of the blunt force. Blood trickled slowly from her nose and mouth, mixing with the tears that were now falling down her cheeks. A second punch, harder than the first, made the world go fuzzy. She felt an uncontrollable urge to vomit; it was as if her brain was being squashed inside her head.

"Lucifer..."

Christine glanced over at Gabriel, who was standing hopelessly. She supposed he had the whole "freeze in the face of danger" thing also. Lucifer ignored his comment, continuing to hit her.

"WHO WAS IT?" Lucifer shouted, shaking her violently.

Christine couldn't speak; she was so numb that she couldn't even recognize the question he had asked. A few more harsh blows to the face and a few more to the ribs left her so bloodied and confused that she couldn't even hear what the muffled voices around me were saying. The only thing she could manage to do was whimper a desperate "please."

Suddenly the punches stopped, but her eyes were so swollen that Christine couldn't see why. The hold on her neck was released and she collapsed on the ground, the now sideways world going black.

"Hey."

"Christine."

"Wake up."

Christine blinked her eyes, which hurt like all hell. Slowly the four blurry heads above came into focus. She tried to sit up, but that hurt like even more hell, making her nearly black out again.

"Whoa, slow down there," The Doctor was kneeling next to her, "you took quite a nasty beating."

Sam was standing a little while off, looking through the trees for the attackers. His brother was wadding up his jacket to make Christine a pillow. Mycroft stood above her, arms crossed.

"What happened?" She mumbled, placing a hand on her throbbing head.

"Mary sent me an owl," Mycroft knelt down on her other side, for the first time there was some genuine concern in his voice, "she said Sherlock had left the dorm and that you hadn't shown up. She also saw Lucifer leave before Sherlock, so she assumed the worst. We sent Cas and Martha to search the castle and we went out here. We followed the shouts and came upon you getting beat to a pulp, but the guys who did it ran off when we arrived. I suppose they thought we were teachers."

Christine groaned and tried to sit up again, this time much slower.

"I can carry you," Dean offered.

"No I'm fine I can stand," she protested, but when she arose she nearly blacked out again.

"Yeah, whatever you say," Dean slid one arm under her neck and the other under her knees.

"Jeez, how much do you weigh?" He groaned.

"That's offensive," she murmured, before slipping into unconsciousness once more.