A/N: Apologies for the delay. I have been having issues with the site. Thanks BranchSuper for the help in getting this up.

Sweets couldn't move. It was like his brain had been turned off and all his muscles frozen. The rush of heat and air from the explosion blasted into his face, and the sky lit up in red and orange, almost blinding him. He could feel his face scorching and his mouth drying out, and the thud of a projectile thrown up by the blast as it landed a foot to his left. His ears rang, and he couldn't hear the commotion around him, or decipher what Dean was yelling, because his brain was stuck in a loop that just said 'It blew up. It blew up! Where are Angela and Hodgins?'

And then Dean was dragging him, and he was stumbling forward through the panicked crowd. People were running and tripping and crashing into each other, making frantic 911 calls at volumes that overcompensated for the hearing loss.

When Sweets' brain finally switched back on, he was leaning against a tree, and Dean was shaking him and saying something. He looked calm and ready to fight, but Sweets could see his hands shaking almost imperceptibly, and his breath was shallow and fast, indicating anxiety. Things were going wrong. The explosion was too big. It hadn't been meant to happen like that.

"Your friends are fine," Castiel informed Sweets, his face as impassive as ever.

It didn't make him feel better. He wouldn't feel better until he saw them for himself.

Sam was there too, and he loomed over Sweets wearing an expression that was no doubt meant to be comforting, and said: "Look, man, I know you're freaking out and you're worried about your friends, but we don't have a lot of time here. We have to get moving. This trap won't hold them for long."

Sweets almost laughed out loud, because of the absurdity of Sam Winchester being the calm and sensible one, after the erratic behaviour and emotional turmoil he had been showing over the last few days. He looked at Dean, who was checking the load of his gun, and realised that this was totally normal for them. Just an average day. He was really glad he wasn't a Winchester.

Sam stood back up to his full height, his face snapping back to the scary soldier setting. "Stay close," he ordered.

Awesome.

They wound through the crowds to the podium in a line. Sam first, then Sweets, then Dean. Castiel had disappeared into the mass of people, a shining angel-sword in each hand. He looked like way more of a badass than Sweets did. Dean had given Sweets a knife. He held it awkwardly with the point forward, and hoped Sam wouldn't stop suddenly. Because it would be really bad if he accidently knifed Sam when he was meant to be the one stopping him from doing something that would raise Lucifer. Like killing someone. Which he would definitely do if Sweets accidently stabbed him.

People kept knocking into him, pushing him out of the way in their rush to escape. The school burnt red against the darkening sky, and it looked a little bit like hell. Or how Sweets had imagined hell. He didn't know what it was really like, which was one of the reasons Dean was objecting so strongly to therapy.

Sweets missed last week, when he was just a psychologist.

They caught a glimpse of Booth and Bones beside the playground. Booth was arresting a very ordinary-looking man in a blue shirt and wire-rimmed glasses, who was objecting strongly to being handcuffed to the monkey bars. Dr Brennan was having a fight with another woman. That was all Sweets saw, because they didn't have time to stop. It made him breathe easier to know they were alive, though.

When they reached the podium, the demon occupying the Superintendent of schools was still there. He was waiting for them. He stayed where he was, on the highest step of the podium, as they walked toward him. He was giving himself the psychological advantage. Make people come to you. Make them look up to see your face. Sweets knew these techniques. He taught them to FBI agents to use in interrogations.

"Don't let him get to you," he whispered to the Winchesters, "Try to make him step down so you won't have to look up at him."

The Winchesters showed no signs of having heard.

The demon smiled at them and gave a casual gesture with his left hand. All the people milling around stepped out, leaving a perfect circle around them, waiting to move in at a word from their master.

"Not big on fair play, are you?" Dean groaned, stepping out from behind Sweets to glare at the demon.

The demon's smile widened. "It's more fun this way. You remember what it's like, don't you?"

Dean's back was straight, and his shoulders were squared and his face was hardened. There was no sign of the exhausted, broken man Sweets had seen earlier that day. It was sad, Sweets thought, that life could mess someone up so badly that they were at their most comfortable and most confident during a standoff with a demon.

Dean smiled. It was big and fake and dangerous. "I haven't had a good night's sleep in forty-three years. I'm in a really bad mood. What's say you just call this whole thing off?"

The demon pretended to think. "And what will you do if we don't? Even you can't think these odds are in your favour. And Sammy! So good to see you. You seem like a fun guy. Let's be friends."

The demon turned to face Sam. Dean took an angry stride forward. "You leave him alone!"

"He's kind of possessive, isn't he Sam? And needy. Always bossing you around and not letting you make your own friends. Always wants everything his way. And you know what the worst thing is? He doesn't even really like you. He has this picture of you in his head from just after he picked you up from Stanford, and he just can't stand it that you aren't dependent on him like that anymore. Why are you sticking with this, Sam? You could have so much more."

"Don't listen to it, Sam! It's lying. Come on, use the knife."

Much as Sweets hated to admit it, the demon had some valid points. Dean did seem to need Sam to validate him, as well as seeming to miss an old, softer, more dependent version of Sam who wasn't really around anymore. But regardless of the truth, the most important thing at the moment was to stop Sam's fragile mind from cracking completely. Sometimes, saving the world had to take precedent over long term psychological well-being. So Sweets lied to Sam Winchester.

There was a vein throbbing in Sam's forehead, and his face was taking on the expression of a kicked puppy. The same expression that had crossed it last time before his eyes had flashed black.

"Sam," Sweets said, in a calm and reasonable voice that didn't even come close to reflecting his true state of mind, "You're a logical man. That's one of your main strengths. I haven't known you long, but I can tell that about you. You're very intelligent, and you're logical. Think about this. Judging from experience, who is more likely to be messing with your head? Who is more likely to have an ulterior motive?"

"The demon. Demons lie. Ruby lied to me for ages." Sam sounded slightly sulky.

"Good. Now, I know you're worried that you've lost Dean's good opinion, but I think you know that's not true."

Sam was nodding. They were getting somewhere. Sweets smiled a little inside. He didn't let it escape though, because that would be unprofessional, and it was totally inappropriate to smile when an elementary school was on fire. Even one that had turned out to be run by Satanists.

The demon cleared its borrowed throat. "Isn't this sweet? Well, sorry to interrupt your little therapy session, but if Sam won't help us willingly, I'm afraid we're going to have to insist. With force." It waved its hand.

The circle closed in.

Sweets hadn't even liked fighting when he was seven and the people he was fighting were slightly larger seven year olds who wanted his lunch money. He liked it less when the people he was fighting were demons with super strength and it was ten on three.

Actually, it was more like ten on two, because the demons mostly ignored him. It was kind of insulting. He was pushed over early on, and crawled around causing minor irritation by stabbing random ankles with his salt-coated knife. It gave him a pleasant feeling of victory to see them off-balance, hopping on one foot for a moment. He was pretty sure that that said some worrying things about his mental state, but he decided not to think about it until the apocalypse was definitely re-averted.

The Winchesters were freaking awesome at fighting, and worked perfectly as a team despite their recent friction, but even so, the demons were rolling over them. Soon, one had Dean face-down in the grass with a knee in his back, and another two were holding Sam. They seemed to have forgotten Sweets.

"Ready to play nice boys?" The head demon hadn't moved from his position atop the podium.

That was when Dean lifted his head from the turf and yelled for Castiel.