Sam wrenched his arm loose from Lucifer's grasp, scrabbled backwards a few feet, then lurched upwards, swaying as he gained his balance. He was between Dean and Crowley. He saw Dean look at Cas, jerk his head leftwards; then he pointed at Crowley and the unknown woman, gestured rightward with two fingers. All the players moved, spread out, and suddenly Lucifer was surrounded.

He just laughed.

"Do you really think this will make any difference? One angel, two demons, two humans." He smiled thinly, made a "come at me" gesture. No one moved. He laughed again.

Sam switched to other-sight. Lucifer was a towering pillar of painful white brilliance, white wings spreading grandly. Cas was a similar, slightly smaller pillar of brilliance with a blue overtone; his wings were darker and smaller. There were wisps of blue-white floating away from his main body, twisting and twining with the edges of Dean's much smaller, bluer essence. Crowley was, as before, a tight ball of deep red; the edges of his essence twined tightly with the edges of the compact knot of blackness that was the woman. Sam switched back to normal sight.

Cas's eyes were grim and determined, glowing blue. He was shining white, and the shadow of his wings rose behind him on the bunker walls. He lifted his hand, gathering blue energy.

Lucifer made a lazy motion, and Cas was smashed into the wall behind him. He slid limply down.

Dean took an abrupt step forward, calling out, "Cas!" Then he stopped, returned his attention to Lucifer, his lips pulled back to bare his teeth. Cas didn't move.

Lucifer ignored Dean, turned to Crowley next. Crowley narrowed his eyes, lifted a hand, snapped his fingers. Nothing happened. Crowley looked down at his hand, puzzled, snapped a few more times. He looked back at Lucifer, who was watching expressionlessly. He snarled, "I should know better than to get mixed up in the Winchesters' messes!"

Lucifer twitched a small smile. "Well, yes, you should..."

Crowley raised his hand to snap another time; Sam couldn't help thinking he was about to disappear like the slimy coward he was. But before he could complete the motion, Lucifer raised his hand, made a sweeping motion, and Crowley went flying through the air, crashing into one of the common room tables. He, too, didn't move.

Sam heard a small gasp from the woman. She had been slowly creeping up behind Lucifer, angel blade ready, but the action with Crowley had caught her attention. Her face twisted, and she leaned forward quickly with the blade, sweeping it across the back of one of Lucifer's legs. He had been turning in response to her gasp, so the blow landed incorrectly. Lucifer's leg buckled slightly, obviously it had landed enough to injure him, but not seriously. He looked down at her, raised his hand in a fist, and smashed down.

Her form crumpled.

Sam moved closer to Dean. They were all that was left.

Dean looked at him, raised his eyebrows, shrugged. Sam shrugged back in return. Then they both looked at Lucifer, who looked back at them.

"Dean and Sam Winchester. Fucking up the Apocalypse multiple times. Well, maybe not this time, eh?" His one-sided smile peeped out. "Dean first, I think, and then it's time to put you down, Sam. A pet that bites...well. It has to be put down." He shrugged. "And, as always...I win." He lifted his hand.

Sam stepped in front of Dean instinctively. "Sammy! Stop!" Dean cried. He grabbed Sam's shoulder, tried to pull him back, but Sam wouldn't budge. He plucked dean's hand off, pushed him back slightly, stared furiously at Lucifer. Anger was roiling through him. His nostrils twitched, his jaw worked, his shoulders hunched. He had absolutely no idea what to do, but he was going to fight Lucifer, dammit, and protect his brother, and be damned with the consequences.

"Sam. Sam, Sam, Sam. You can't win. You just can't." The voice was light, tuned to wiggle down, dig into Sam's fears, self-doubts.

"I won once. I'll do it again," he ground out. Never mind that he still, to this day, had no idea how he had done it. He concentrated, gathering his power, raised his hand.

Lucifer's eyes lit with triumph. "That's right, Sammy, use those powers of yours. Disintegrate me into molecules. Twist me like the lines of energy you've been doodling with. Flick me here and there with it."

Sam paused. This was wrong. He was strong, but Cas had been strong, Crowley had been strong. In a battle of power, strength, Lucifer would always win.

"Powers? Sammy, have you been playing with that psychic shit?" Sam closed his eyes in frustration. Trust Dean to latch onto that!

He reopened his eyes to see Lucifer laughing gently. "Oh, yes, Dean, he's been playing with them. Not much else for him to do, right? He's also been drink - "

Nope. Not gonna let him tell Dean about the demon blood!

Sam flung power wildly. Lucifer batted it aside easily, but didn't finish the sentence, distracted.

"You two. It's always you two against the world, isn't it?" Sam heard a hint of bitter jealousy lurking behind the words. And it struck him. That was it. That was how to fight him.

He closed his eyes. Dug deep. Reached for all the concealed loneliness, fear, self-doubt, bitterness that he had ever felt. The shame at being reintroduced to his demon blood addiction. The self-hate for giving in to Crowley's lure. The anger at being tricked by Dean into being possessed by Gadreel. The fear of Cas, when he had been loaded up with souls from Purgatory. The pain at losing Madison, Jess, Amelia. The despair at feeling dad would never love him, appreciate him for what he was. The feeling of being a freak. The betrayal he felt when Ruby revealed herself.

He took all those feelings and - somehow, some way - shaped a mental spear. He opened his eyes, locked eyes with Lucifer, and let them flow, threw them at him.

It wasn't direct power, no. That was not the way you beat Lucifer. But holding up an emotional mirror to someone who had no emotional support...?

Lucifer staggered. His face twisted. He raised his hands to his head, clutched it, groaned.

Sam pushed the spear of emotions harder. Lucifer fell to his knees, eyes squeezed shut, tears leaking out. "Father!" he cried. "Father! Why did you abandon me?! Why? I loved you most of all! I was your best! Why did you turn away from me, cast me out?"

Sam strode forward, grabbed Lucifer by the neck, shook him. "Because He finally figured out that you're a fucking spoiled, selfish, self-absorbed toddler, who wasn't worth his time, you douchebag!" he gritted out. "Now GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY BODY!"

Everything wrenched, twisted, turned inside out.

Pain.

Flaring in his shoulders, his legs. Every breath he took hurt. Iron spikes drove through his body, pulsed red-hot in time with his heartbeat. He threw his head back, screamed, and crumpled to the floor.

Danielle and Charlie were playing gin rummy when chaos erupted.

Lucifer, who had stood stock still in the circle of fire for an hour, screamed shrilly in pain and fell to the floor.

Actinic white light blew outward, blinding them. Then it vanished.

Smoke - red, black, blue-white - emerged from his mouth. The blue-white grace slid over to Cas, slipped into him. A deep red cloud descended into Crowley. The black smoke crawled across the floor and slithered into Danielle's lap, like an exhausted snake. A piece of the blue had separated from Cas's grace and filtered back into Dean; he shifted and moaned.

Charlie looked wildly at Danielle, then leapt to her feet, moving to Dean. Danielle ignored her, stroking the black smoke, and saying urgently, "Dani?! Dani! Are you all right?!"

The black smoke stirred, lifted feebly, then slid slowly into her.

Hey.

~~are you all right?! what happened?!~~

Don't know. Lucifer smashed Cas and Crowley, then got me before I could hamstring him, distract him. Don't know what happened next. God, my head hurts.

~~thanks to you, mine does, too, and now I feel banged up all over...~~

Hah. That's what you get, becoming besties with a demon stupid enough to try to fight Lucifer.

Dani opened her eyes, looked around wearily. Charlie was helping Dean sit up; aside from some confusion, he was in the best shape, she judged. Cas and Crowley were just beginning to stir. She stood up, feeling like someone had rolled over her with a Mack truck, shuffled into the kitchen, rummaged in the cupboard until she found some ibuprofen, swallowed two dry. She filled a glass of water and staggered back into the living room, ibuprofen bottle in hand.

Dean was holding Sam's limp body in his arms, staring at Cas, who was slowly working his way up into a sitting position, holding his head. Dani stepped over to Cas, shook out two pills, handed them and the glass to him. He took the glass and looked at the pills in his hand blankly.

"What are these?" he asked, puzzled.

"Take them. They'll make your body feel better."

He shifted his sapphire gaze to her and blinked, dazed. Then he looked back down at the pills, shrugged, and put them in his mouth.

"Tch. Drink some water, it'll help them go down."

"Oh." He lifted the glass, drank some, coughed and sputtered. She had the feeling that he had never done this before.

She took the glass back, turned away to head to Crowley next. She saw, out of the corner of her eyes, Cas stand up and stagger to the circle of fire, hold his hands out. The fire shrank down, then disappeared. She didn't see what happened next, as she pulled Crowley's head into her lap, stroked his cheek.

~~so. is pb all right?~~

What do you care?

~~um.~~

He pried his eyes open, looked around, then looked up at her. He gave her a small smile, and said, very quietly, "Dani-girl, I may need to take a rain check on that little assignation we were talking about earlier..."

She laughed shakily, pulled him up to a sitting position leaning against her, and shook out two more pills. She handed them to him with the glass.

"My hero." He downed them with a swig of water, then closed his eyes, sighed, and leaned back against her more limply.

"Let's not do that again any time soon, shall we?" he murmured.

"No," she said, leaning her head on his. "I think we've all had enough adventure for a while."

The pain had knocked him out, but he was back again. The pain abruptly seared through his body as someone pulled him into a sitting position, held him up. A hand gripped his chin, then patted his cheek urgently.

"Sam! Sammy! Talk to me, dammit! Are you all right?"

He put up a weak hand to push the hand patting him away, cracked his eyes open. Dean. Of course. He struggled to sit up a bit higher, then slumped back against the arms circling him.

"Dude. I feel like shit. Everything hurts," he muttered.

Dean laughed softly, and the arms around him tightened. He hissed at the pain, and Dean quickly loosened the hug.

"Sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry, didn't mean to hurt you more, man, just so damned glad to see you and have it be you, y'know?"

"Yeah, yeah." He was quiet for a moment, drifting in and out, then pulled himself together to say, "We did it. Didn't we?"

"Yeah. Cas, get your ass over here, dammit!" Dean called out, looking away. He looked back. "We did it. You did it. What the hell did you do? The last I remember is you stepping in front of me, and then suddenly Lucy was crying like a baby about his dad and you were telling him what a shitty kid he was. What the hell was that all about?!"

Cas was suddenly kneeling by him, eyes weary, eyebrows puckered in a frown. Sam automatically switched to other-sight, saw him as the blue-white flame, though much smaller now, saw Dean's compact human soul, saw the tendrils on the edges twining together -

He froze, snapped out of other-sight abruptly, caught his breath.

Cas was leaning forward, putting two fingers on his forehead. He felt the wounds in his shoulders and legs begin to knit back together, close up. It was always a very strange feeling, to be healed by Cas...

Other-sight. He still had other-sight. He closed his eyes, slumped back against Dean.

"So what did you do, anyway?" Dean asked again.

"Eh. Couldn't fight him. Gave him a taste of all my unhappy memories and feelings, all at once, instead." He was feeling better. The pain was receding rapidly, energy taking its place. He opened his eyes again, leaned forward, out of Dean's protective arms, turned to look at him. He laughed. "I think it was my memories of fighting with Dad all the time that really got him."

Dean made a face of agreement, nodded his head. "Dude's got real daddy issues," he said.

Sam laughed again. "Yeah. And he doesn't have friends or family supporting him, he's all alone..."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Lifetime movie mush."

Sam reached out, grabbed his arm, shook it, smiled at him. "Don't knock it. If I didn't have you...well. I don't know what kind of mess I'd be. You're always there, always have my back - "

Dean shifted uncomfortably, looked away, stood up. He held out his hand to help Sam up, saying, "Okay. Bro moment over, dude. Get up. Let's get a beer, have some food."

Sam stood up, looked around. Charlie was standing by Cas, talking to him softly. Cas was smiling down at her, nodding his head. On the other side of the room, beyond the smudged chalk sigils and bowls tilted on their sides, stood Crowley, arms around the strange woman, chin on her head. Dean moved into the kitchen, opened the fridge, pulled out a six-pack of bottles, came back in and started handing them out.

"What? No scotch?" Crowley grumbled, taking a beer.

"Deal with it," Dean said lightly, handed another to the woman, then moved on to Charlie.

Sam walked toward Crowley and the woman, grabbing a beer from Dean as he passed him. Crowley he didn't give a fuck about, but the woman...

He stopped, held out his hand. "I'm Sam Winchester."

She looked up at him, took his hand, shook it briskly, tilted her head up and back further. She said, "Whoa. You are extremely tall, y'know that?"

He smiled down at her. "I've heard it before."

Crowley drawled, "A bloody giraffe. Moose, this is Dani Lippmann, my...head research honcho."

Sam darted a narrow-eyed glance at Crowley. Crowley smiled lazily, lifting an amused eyebrow. Sam switched briefly to other-sight, saw the way their smoke knotted together at the edges. No accounting for taste. Then he switched back to normal vision, looked back down at Dani.

"Pleased to meet you, Dani. Thanks for helping out. Having everyone there - " He stopped, gritted his teeth, looked at Crowley. " - Even you, Crowley - " he added reluctantly. Crowley smiled wider, gave him a tiny bow. " - was what gave me the time to come up with something to get Lucifer. I understand you're something of an occult researcher...?"

Charlie pulled Dani into the hallway a little later. "Tomorrow's Thanksgiving. We're having a proper Thanksgiving dinner. Cas arranged it. And I'm inviting you two."

Dani opened her mouth, closed it. "We'll see."

"Oh, come! It'll be fun! And we'll celebrate Sam being back!"

Dani smiled. "Maybe," she said. "Thanks for the invite." She walked over to Crowley, who was leaning against the wall in the living room, watching everything with a small smile tugging at his lips. She leaned against the wall next to him. He slid an arm around her, pulled her close.

"We're invited for Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow," Dani murmured. He glanced down at her in surprise, eyebrows lifting.

"Really?" he drawled. "How tiresome."

"And a welcome-back celebration..." she added.

He narrowed his eyes, looked across the room at Sam Winchester, who was standing with his brother and the handsome angel. He pursed his lips, and said, slowly, "I suppose that means we need to bring a gift. Ugh."

She poked him softly in the side. "We don't have to go, y'know. If you don't want to."

"Darling. I wouldn't miss it for the world." He looked back down at her, smiled in a different way. He lifted a hand, trailed the back of it across her cheek. "I seem to have recuperated remarkably, pet. Perhaps our assignation can be back on...?" She smiled back up at him, her cheek tingling. He slid the hand down to her neck, pulled her closer, bent his head. The kiss was long and languid. Then he drew in a breath, pushed her back against the wall, tangled his hand in her hair, kissed her harder.

"Hey! You two! Get a room, for God's sake!" Dean shouted.

"Excellent idea," Crowley answered. He snapped his fingers, and they vanished.