And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. And the Lord God planted a garden eastward of Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. Genesis 2:7-8

Dean Dreams of Hell

He leaned into the form that writhed and squirmed on the rack. He breathed in their fear and breathed out contentment. He was capable of so much since he took up the knife. Alastair even said so. He slivered off skin and muscle and more. He dipped deep into the creature's hand and extracted just the bones that were at the tops of the fingers.

The songs of their screams rang out throughout the halls. Dean sometimes sang along. They screamed, and he echoed them back. It was a game of "no one will ever save you." He looked at the lips on this one and decided not to cut them...too much. He reached back to the long table and selected a small grimy jar. In it were dry white writhing masses of white, Bot Fly Larvae. They would burrow and eat their way through the form. He made a small slit at the edge of the bottom lip and with a pair of long ended tweezers, Dean plucked out a larvae to insert into the slit.

The creature slammed her head back and forth frantically. He reached behind her head and slid the engraved leather strap up over her forehead. It seemed to hold her in place. She began sucking in her lip as if to protect her mouth from the invasion that she surely saw coming. He waited for her to become calm.

He did not talk to them like Alastair did. He did not try to calm them or fake a friendship that did not, could not exist. The scream songs were his only exception, and he only succumbed to that tactic when he was truly bored. Mostly, he worked in silence. If information needed to be extracted, he did it in silence while Alastair or another demon listened. He was not sure why this one was brought in. Her lips relaxed a little. She spoke again. "Please let me go." Predictable. They always begged. It all sounded the same. "I shouldn't be here." Also, predictable. He slipped the larvae into the slit in her lip and stepped back.

She was weeping. The sounds of the weeping pulled at Dean a little, but just a little. It felt familiar in a way that the other cries and pleas in this place did not. He pulled out another larvae to add to the lip.

She quivered beneath his hand as he brought it close, but she did not fight him. This too, was odd and pulled at him again. He inserted it, and went back to the jar for a third. He grasped the larvae in his tweezers and lifted it before her face, giving her a good long look at the creature. Then he pressed it into her lip and sat back on a high stool, surveying his handy work. The roll of flesh squirmed with the tightness that the larvae created.

She spoke again, "I hear the angels singing." This time Dean was surprised. Then a form appeared at his back.

"I will take over from here." Alastair stirred over to his side, moving Dean along with a gentle brush of his arm. He could see Alastair reaching into the woman's form to extract her soul. What he removed was small. It fit snuggly in the palm of his hand. The glow was faint as it spun about in his fingers, threatening to spill over with each movement of his hand. Alastair stirred then and seemed to be listening to something in the room. He slid the soul back into her body, and a slight smile curled up at the edges of his lips.

Dean thought that this was odd too. Alastair always kept a little for himself. He seemed to be preparing to leave, when he turned to Dean. "Why don't you step out for a bit. Get some rest. I will be along in a minute."

"Would you like me to move her back to the other room?" Dean asked.

"No, I will leave her in here for tonight." Alastair walked out the door with a knowing smile still on his face. "Good night little mother." He threw back into the room.

Dean did not understand, but at least there would be rest.

Scotland

In the beginning, there was darkness, and in that darkness there was potential. A story formed in the mind of God, a story of life, and love, and pain. It was a great tale that should be told, lived. So the darkness took on light, life, and a beginning.

Fergus began in much the same way. A vain creature by all accounts, consumed by his own desires, darkness. His mother hated him, his wife hated him, and with every action that he committed to in his pathetic human life, he made his kid hate him too.

He was a man that learned the value of a good story. You need a good story to get through the darkness. When he would wake after his long nights of drinking, the sights that would greet him required storytelling. He had to tell a story to explain the bruises on his child's face. He had to tell a story to shave away the guilt he felt when he saw his child crumpled in the corner starving because his father was more concerned with obtaining liquid sustenance.

When he met with the demon, it was not as surprising to him as it would have been to other humans. He knew this kind of darkness already, had grown comfortable with it churning about in his gut. Of course he did not know that he was a demon from the beginning. In the beginning, the demon was a man, a charming man with dusty blond hair and a slight British accent.

The demon sat next to him at the pub and even bought him a drink. Fergus told the demon some stories. Complete fabrications about his life, lack of a wife, freedom. The night was pleasant. He did not think about home, or the stories that he would have to tell himself once he returned to it.

Each night, for a week, Fergus returned to that pub. Gradually, the stories changed. Gradually, they took on notes from his real life, and Fergus did not even realize the change to the stories until they had completely stopped being fabrications. He had a wife, a child, and no prospects for freedom.

The demon spoke to him in hushed tones. Comforting him much as the days progressed. It felt like more than a week had passed in that span of time. Perhaps, it was longer. It is hard to say what really happened now. So much time had passed since Crowley had allowed himself to look at those days. It was not pleasant to look at Fergus and be reminded of what he had been.

It was on the seventh day of their acquaintance that he had learned of the demon's story. He had left the pub to return home, but that night he did not walk alone. The demon walked with him. There was no reason for it beyond companionship.

When they had neared the door of his tiny hovel, it flew open. His wife had shot out of it with all of the force of her minuscule frame. She had nearly knocked him over with the force of her. She threw her arms against him, beating him savagely. "I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!" She screamed at him. The beating had begun to sober him up. He tried to grab her arms to hold her back. The demon stood off to the side taking it in. "He's dead, dead, dead." She wailed and crumpled to the ground.

He stood still staring down at her. Then, he looked into the open door and saw his son on the bed. He had been on the bed for the past week. However, this time he was not asleep. What had he missed when he came home each night, too drunk to really see. He stumbled past his wife and forced himself into the house, toward the bed.

He looked down at the child. "Lucky bastard," he muttered. The demon joined him. Despite the words, Fergus slumped down to the mattress and pressed his hand to the child's cheek.

"You don't really mean that." The demon said almost as a question.

"No, I don't. He was never lucky. I was his father." Fergus looked only at the child as he spoke. "I would give anything if he could have just a little luck now."

"Humans." The demon muttered as he looked up at Fergus' face, drawing his attention from the child. "They never see what matters until it is too late."

"Nothing matters. It has always been too late." Fergus stood then. He had wanted to leave, but he had no where to go.

"I could give him a little luck, but it will cost you." Fergus looked at the demon and saw his eyes shift to black. He fell back onto the ground. He did not move from there though. "You just have to say the word, and I can give him luck." The demon, then, stooped down to the floor and looked into Fergus' face.

Fergus had trouble forming the words and spoke with hesitation. "What do I need to do?"

And if there had been any doubt before about what Fergus would do next the demon's words had sealed the deal, for although, Fergus wanted to give his child luck, he was still a selfish creature. "You will have to give up your soul. Normally, I would give you ten years, but that can't happen here. You are trading for a life that has already passed on. That is a lot of luck."

"How long do I have to live after the deal is made?" Fergus asked.

The demon seemed to understand what was really being asked, "You may leave immediately if that is your wish."

"It wouldn't be luck if I stayed." He paused for a moment, then got up off of the floor. He moved back to the bed, to the child. "Goodbye," he said, then added, "Good luck." He had turned to the demon then and said, "I am ready, and I agree to your terms."

The demon had leaned in then and pressed his lips to Fergus'. The deal was made. Then, Fergus fell back from the kiss in a dead heap on the mattress beside his son. His face looked peaceful for the first time in years. It looked like a man at rest.

Gunnison Island

There were three times that Crowley said that he had approached Mary before he saw her again in Purgatory. This did not mean that he really kept his distance. He watched her, but he did not let her know that he was there except on those three very important occasions.

The first time was when he made the decision to give her a little extra soul. The second time was just after Azazel had burned her into the ceiling. The third was when he raised her from Perdition.

He began telling his story. In parts anyway. He would tell the rest before the day was out, and not to any one of them entirely. He gave the tale of her inception to Sam, the tale of the fire would go to Mary later, and the tale of Perdition had been told to Balthazar already, since the latter knew most of it first hand. He did not have a story for Castiel or Israfel. Castiel would be too preoccupied with Dean to hear it anyway. Israfel could glean what was needed from Sam's mind.

Everything seemed to be falling into place. He settled a hand on Sam's shoulder, watching his face as he struggled to take it all in. His mother, Eve, all of it, seemed to be overloading him. "They both loved you, Sam."

"What do you mean?" He looked up at Crowley.

"Your mother and Eve. The first time that Mary had entered the nursery, she wept. Eve was conscious then too. Mary scooped you up, fed you at her breast, but it was Eve that said, 'my boy, my boy, my boy.'" Crowley stepped back from Sam and turned out to the lake again. "I watched her often from the shadows. She seemed to lose the agony and the pain. I was grateful. I wanted her to know peace."

"Of all of the women in the world that you could have chosen, you chose a woman with a demon deal." Sam huffed.

"It was the taint of Azazel that drew me to her. I knew that she did not sell her soul, but the connection to him would, I thought, make her more accessible. She had already let him in a little. I could not have known how that night in the nursery would have played out."

"Why did you keep watching her? I thought that you needed distance."

"I thought that I did too. However, I just couldn't stop myself. She changed me. I wanted to watch her with you and Dean. I wanted to watch her live. So I did. There was much that I wanted."

Sam squirmed uncomfortably at the last statement. "Where was my dad in all of this? Didn't he notice a difference?"

"There was nothing to notice. Eve rested, mostly. She only stirred when Mary interacted with you and Dean. I think that Mary saw this as the deal that she had made before. She seemed to be content with it. She ran the day to day actions and accepted the little extra consciousness that surfaced from time to time. That scruffy faced man had no clue." He seemed to smirk at the memory of John.

"Did you watch dad too?"

"Only because Mary loved him." Crowley shifted about. "I suppose that he changed me too."

"How so?"

"I picked my meatsuit because I felt that it looked a bit like him. I thought that it would appeal to Mary and thus Eve more if I took on a somewhat familiar form."

"So what will happen now? Why is she here?" Sam asked.

"I believe that Alastair plans to use her. How, remains to be seen." He paused then continued, "But I also believe that he has underestimated her. He has underestimated love. The very love that has so entertained me for years. She is fighting him, and I believe that she can win. I believe that there is enough love left in her for that."