Supernatural – Heart of Gold
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. I do own Haley, Dethton and the Heart of Gold Prophecy.
Author's Note: Okay, since I've got so many ideas as to what I can write, I'd like to hear (well, read) what my readers would like to see next. Since this is the last chapter before the epilogue, I'd like anyone who reviews to tell me which of the story ideas I have posted on my profile that you think looks best for my next fanfic. I already have a vague idea which one I'll do next, but I may change if something else turns out to be more attractive to the readers' eye.
And thank you to Chase for being the beta reader.
Review Answers: Haven't missed anyone, have I? Don't think so.
Robinisawsome: Ya think? Well, you're the reviewer, who am I to argue, glad you liked it. I actually made you cry? I feel accomplished.
EmSyd: Yes, I was aiming for as emotional as was humanly possible. I may not have achieved that, I'm still refining that particular writing skill, but judging by the feedback, I did well enough. Here's more, enjoy it.
puplover77: So cool. Touching. Both sound good to me, glad you liked it.
skycandygirl: Lots and lots of compliments help to make me happier. Yeah, I couldn't really leave her as a psi-vamp, now, could I? Or could I? I guess we'll never know now. Lol.
Ghostwriter: Yeah, it was, wasn't it?
erica22: Yes, everyone has lived to fight (or die -innocent smile) another day.
carocali: Really? Ya think so? Hmm, okays, that's interesting to know. Yeah, I thought the stachels was a good idea, and I knew that a salt circle would contain Haley, but then I was faced with the problem of how to get her out so I could play out the plot I'd planned.To my knowledge, I created the Heart of Gold myth. I figured that, since both the psi-vamp and Haley were empathic, it seemed to fit well that it would be the cause for hr descension (sp?)... like that word... anyway, glad Haley turned out to be loved (by more then Sam), and you liked her empathy. As for the ending, that's right around the corner, if I could only start it, lol. Anyway, hope you enjoy what remains of the story.
Chapter 37 – Numb
'…she will walk amongst the dead, as evil stands beside her.' His lips weren't moving, but the voice that wasn't quite his voice seemed to fill the room. 'The blood of her heart will stain her hands, and the darkness shall feed upon it to rise from its bonds.'
"A man… He found some sort of… power… that allowed him to fight off the demon," he said. "They called it the-"
"Heart of Gold," Sam said suddenly, not a doubt in his mind he was right. Both John and Dean stared at him.
"This man, he fought the demon, damn-near killed it, too. Probably would have if he hadn't been exhausted and killed himself," he said. "But the demon, it couldn't return to its former power; the Heart of Gold had weakened it to the point where it was barely alive. These days, it's nothing more than a parasite, feeding off of others…"
"'The Heart of Gold Prophecy," he said out-loud. "When moon and sun share the sky as one, and the day gives way to dark. The one who walks the line will rise, and step out of the shadows of others to walk the night. She will walk amongst the dead, as evil stands beside her. And the blood of her heart will stain her hands, and the darkness shall feed upon it to rise from its bonds."
His eyes went wide at the complicity of the document. Despite trying his hardest, he couldn't make sense of any of it. Save two words.
"Haley Evans." He looked up. "What's Haley have to do with this?"
Haley removed her sunglasses, and Sam gasped, taking a step back when he saw the soulless black eyes of a demon staring at him where Haley's blue eyes normally were. "I'm what is," she said, a wicked grin spreading on her lips. "I'm evil." She turned and stabbed, the knife plunging into Haley's back.
Haley's eyes went wide and she sat bolt upright, swayed unsteadily, and then fell back, feeling strangely refreshed despite the abrupt awakening. She closed her eyes, feeling a strain on her mind as memories flooded her consciousness. Sam's memories; the ones she'd ripped out of his mind when she'd tried to torture him. Thoughts of that suddenly made her aware of just how much damage she'd caused over the past day or so.
"Sam…" she said softly. Would he forgive her for what she'd done? Would Dean? Dean was the one who'd suffered the most at her hands. Guilt swelled up inside her when she remembered everything she'd done to Dean. Guilt and disgust; was her dark side really that dark?
Briefly, she saw the black haired woman that had called herself Haley's dark side. Was it possible that it had actually taken on a life of its own? Through the essence of the psi-vamp that had infected Haley?
She suddenly became aware of a steady course of beeps coming from not far away. She looked around and discovered, to her horror, that she was in a hospital. As if this realization opened a floodway, the emotional stress hospitals brought her started to fill her mind. She reached up to rub her head… and found something burdening her hand. She looked down and saw a large hand holding tightly onto hers. Her gaze moved up the arm, and took in the messy brown hair and sleeping face of Sam, his head resting on his other arm which was on the bed. She couldn't help but smile; the doubts that he would forgive her beginning to melt away as she watched him sleep. She brought her hand to her mouth, kissed her fingertips, and touched Sam lightly on the top of the head, before laying her hand over his.
"Haley…?" Sam whispered in a small voice. The relief in Sam's eyes as he slowly raised his head to see if she had really woken up made Haley wonder just how long she'd been sleeping. Sam blinked rapidly, as if not quite convinced he was really seeing her. "Haley?" he said again, a little stronger this time. A small smile spread on his lips. She nodded, reaching over and pulling him into a brief, but intimate kiss. It was beautiful in its simplicity, and Haley found herself lost in the memories of those few times where their love had been at its strongest.
But then she pulled back as less appealing memories, some hers, some Sam's, crept into her happiness. But her smile didn't falter as she stared at Sam.
"Thank you," she said in a small voice, her throat feeling raw. She reached up and rubbed her neck, and Sam frowned apologetically.
"An after-affect of expelling a demonic essence out of your mouth," he explained. "I had hoped that it would have worn off by now."
"'By now'?" Haley echoed, her throat still soar. "How…" She swallowed. "How long have I been asleep?" she asked. Sam's frown deepened.
"Haley, you've been unconscious for almost two weeks," he said. Haley's eyes widened, and she laid back against her pillows.
"'Two weeks…'"
"Is there an echo in here or something?" Sam said; his voice sounded scolding, but the small smile and look of pure relief in his eyes told Haley he was just happy to have her back. She returned his smile, and yet something inside her was telling her to hold back. Something wasn't quite right. In an effort to take her mind off it (and at the same time draw the subject away from she and Sam), she reluctantly asked the question that had been first and foremost on her mind after Sam's forgiveness.
"How's Dean?" she asked. Sam's smile faded.
"He's… coping," he said. Haley looked away.
"How badly did I hurt him?" she whispered meekly.
"Why don't you ask him yourself?" Haley looked up and saw Dean. Dean being pushed into the room on a wheel chair by Missouri. Her frown deepened. "What, no happy hello?" he asked, a warm smile on his face. "Okay, I suppose I can let it slide this one time, considering you just woke up," he said. "And on that note," he reached over and hit Sam lightly on the back of the head. Sam yelped in surprise.
"What was that for?" he whined, looking over at his brother.
"Why wasn't I told she'd woken up?" the older brother demanded in a mock-angry tone.
"Give me a break, she only just woke me up," Sam mock-complained. Dean shook his head, pretending to be disappointed in his brother.
"Sleeping on the job, Sammy," he sighed. "Imagine if Dad came in here and found you like that?" he asked, doing his best impersonation of their father's tone, despite the fact he looked like he was about to burst into a fit of laughter.
After a few minutes of somewhat awkward silence, Haley took in the faces of Sam, Dean and Missouri. Finally, she spoke up.
"Dean, I'm… sorry," she said, looking at the man she'd come to regard as much as a brother as Sam did. "For what I did to you." She was trying hard not to dwell on those memories. From the look on Dean's face as soon as she brought it up, he was trying to do the same thing. Being Dean, he shrugged off the attempt apology with a cocky grin, followed by…
"Hey, you know, chicks dig a guy with scars…" he said with a shrug. "You just happened to give me… a whole lot of new ones," he added. Haley continued to frown. "Hey, come on, don't dwell on it. Stop living in the past… do what Sam does best and look into the future."
Sam gave a short laugh. "I'll ignore that," he said flatly right after the laugh. Dean flashed Sam a grin, before turning back to Haley.
"I'm serious," he said. "You weren't yourself, I get that." Haley still looked doubtful. "If you want I can yell at you some," he offered, his grin getting wider.
Rolling her eyes, Haley took one of the pillows out from behind her and hurled it at Dean, who threw his arms up to protect his face.
"Easy, easy, I'm an injured person over here," he said. "I ought to be treated like one."
"I'll remember that tonight when it's time for your shower," Missouri said with a mischievous grin. Dean's eyes went wide and Sam burst out laughing, joined soon after by Haley. Behind Dean, though, Missouri turned a worried gaze on Haley, who saw it, and had a feeling Missouri knew something about her other feeling. About what was keeping her from opening up completely to Sam again.
They were released from the hospital a couple of days after Haley woke up (well, Sam already was), on the condition that they rested up plenty. Dean saw this as a chance to make Sam wait on him hand and foot. Haley saw this as a chance to try and sort through all the new memories that had taken up residence in her head.
Missouri left, returning to Lawrence, but not before she made Sam, Dean and Haley promise to visit her. Then, a couple mornings after, Sam woke up and found a note from his father explaining that, until the demon surfaced again, it would be better if they went their separate ways.
So, once again, it was just the three of them. Or more, it was Sam and his two patients, even if Haley was only being spoiled rotten because Sam insisted on it (she was tired, she wasn't actually injured).
But eventually, even the joy of having Sam as his willing and obedient slave grew boring for Dean, so one morning, he talked his brother into taking him for a drive around town (and Haley noted with amusement the embarrassment he was feeling at having to beg his brother to take him out). Sam offered to take Haley as well, but she refused. She was still trying to work out exactly what she remembered and what Sam remembered, and until she did, she didn't want to have to deal with the effects of her empathy as well. So she stayed behind.
She was scanning old newspaper articles on the internet, looking for any jobs they could do once Dean had the stitches in his thigh taken out and had finished his recovery. She still cringed every time she remembered that she was the one that had done that to him, and not for the first time remembered the dream Sam had had. Then something else crept out of her vast array of memories. Like one of Sam's visions it seemed to force its way into her mind.
Not really sure what he was doing, or why for that matter, he typed the first nine words he had spoken into the Google search engine.
He waited a few seconds, and then the links to a few different pages appeared on the screen. Biting his lower lip, Sam went to the first one, which had an exact match.
The website at first appeared to be nothing more than a black screen. Then words slowly began to appear, sending a chill down Sam's spine despite the fact he knew it was just computer animation. He looked at the header of the page.
"'The Heart of Gold Prophecy'," he said out-loud.
She frowned. She'd never been that good with remembering details, except when it came to a hunt, but Sam's memories… they were as vivid as if she was living them right at that moment. All of them.
Not really aware of what she was doing, she moved the cursor across the screen and clicked the history button, going through the websites Sam had been to. It went back four weeks, which was good, because it had been three weeks since he had been to the site. She clicked on it, and watched as the words moved onto the screen. She gave an involuntary shudder as she remembered the documents John had shown Sam. Like everything else, she saw them as clear as if they were right in front of her. Saw the calculations, the writings, everything. None of it made sense to her, just as it hadn't to Sam. Except her name. What did she have to do with it? That was the one thing Sam had never found out. Or if he had, it had been after she'd taken his memories.
She read the prophecy, unease settling in as the words reached her ears, like someone else was reading them out to her. She stared at the screen, her breath quickening, unsure what to make of it. Then she thought of something else that might answer the question that was weighing down on her mind: What did this mean to her? And what did it have to do with her?
She tilted her head to the side, remembering something. Something she hadn't seen.
"You hold onto these, Sam," John said, handing Sam the envelope of documents he'd gotten out of the post office. "You've worked out more about them since you saw them than I have since I first found out about them." Sam stared at the envelope, not quite sure what to say.
Haley frowned. She turned around, remembering where Sam had put the envelope. She got to her feet and walked over to the bedside table, pulled open the drawer and took out the plain envelope, sitting down on the bed and staring at it. Biting her lip, she opened it and slipped the documents out, feeling a sense of foreboding as she began to examine them.
Sam sagged only slightly under his brother's weight as he helped Dean down the hall. As much as the older Winchester didn't want to admit it, he was still easily tired out, trying to recover from the beating Haley had given him.
"Dean, we need to monitor your eating habits," he said. "I think you've gained some wait since the last time I had to carry you."
"I'm not surprised," Dean said. "Last time you actually carried me that you weren't running on adrenaline, I was, what? Nineteen?" he asked. Sam laughed, and realized they'd reached their room. He reached over with his free arm (since the other one was currently supporting Dean) and pulled open the room door.
He froze when he saw Haley sitting on the bed. What caught his attention was the empty envelope and the different papers strewn over the bed. Haley's eyes were locked onto one document in her hand. She looked up as Sam walked into the room supporting Dean, a somewhat distressed look on her face.
"Dean, your brother and I need to talk," she said, getting to her feet and letting the paper fall to the bed behind her. Sam bit his lip, but helped Dean over to his own bed. The older brother shrugged him off when he tried to help him get into bed.
"I'm injured, I'm not an invalid," he said. "Go talk to your girlfriend." He slipped under the covers of the bed, reached over and grabbed the TV remote, hitting the power button. Haley stared at him for a few minutes before turning back to Sam. She didn't say anything, but the look on her face told him enough. She walked past him, and out the door. Sam turned and followed.
Haley didn't stop until they were both out at the car, then she turned an accusing look on Sam.
"Why didn't you tell me?" she demanded. Sam refused to look at her, and she felt a mixture of shame, regret and annoyance rising up inside him.
"I didn't… I wanted to be sure… but I wasn't…"
"Sure of what?" Haley interrupted. "Sure that I was going to die?" she snapped, voicing the thoughts both of them were thinking. Sam finally looked at her. "'The blood of her heart will stain her hands,'" she recited. "Since it takes about fifteen-to-twenty seconds for the human heart to stop beating after it's damaged, I think it's safe to say we can be sure."
"Maybe not," he said hopefully. "The words of a prophecy aren't always literal," he said.
"They're not always figurative, either," Haley said.
"What are you so upset about?" Sam snapped suddenly. "Is that something you wanted to hear right after waking up from a coma? That according to a prophecy, you're supposed to, not only die at the hands of the demon we're hunting, but your blood is supposed to be what returns it to power?"
"No," Haley said. "That's not what I'm upset about." She turned away, not looking at Sam. As if he could read her mind, Sam rolled his eyes and stared at her.
"We're not getting back to this again, are we?" he said. She turned back to him.
"This is the exact reason why it's so hard," she said. "As a hunter, I might've been able to accept why you kept this a secret from me. But tell me, if we weren't together, would you have tried so hard to keep it from me?" Now it was Sam's turn to look away. "Or would you have told me straight out and let me deal with it in my own way?"
"No, I wouldn't have let you deal with it on your own, love or not," Sam said.
"But you wouldn't have kept it a secret," Haley said. "This is my point. This relationship is getting in the way of our job. How're we supposed to protect people if we're too worried about protecting each other?" Sam still wouldn't look at her. "We can't hunt together and be together, Sam. It… it won't work," she said, and Sam could tell it cut her up inside to say it.
"I can't stop loving you…" he said meekly. "I won't," he added. Haley nodded, tears coming to her eyes.
"Neither will I," she said. Sam turned to look at her then.
"So, what? We just stop hunting?" he asked. She bit her lip, and shook her head.
"No," she said. "You don't." Sam blinked.
"What?" he demanded. Haley stared at him, hating herself for what she was about to say.
"I'm leaving," she said. "I'm your Achilles heel Sam. Just like you're mine." She shrugged. "As long as I'm around, you won't hunt. At least you won't hunt at the top of your game." Sam was shaking his head. He had been since she'd told him her decision. She swallowed, and tried to walk past him. Before she could, though, Sam took hold of her with both hands pulled her into a deep, passionate kiss. Her first instinct was to just let herself drown in it, give into him. She pushed the thought aside, and then pushed him away. She saw the hurt in his eyes; tears had started to fall from both there eyes, and they just stared at each other. "I'm sorry," she said, and pushed past him, taking off at a run. Sam just stood there, dumb-founded. He didn't hear the thunder crash in the sky, see the clouds gather, or feel the rain as it started bucketing down around him. He felt… numb.
A/N: So, what do y'all make of that? Review and let me know, I've almost reached 100 reviews, yay.