A/N: For those of you who wondered how Circe and the forces of Heaven and Hell tormented Sam, Tiesen, Rika, and Chale, wonder no longer. Weird imagery ahead. Soundtrack for this one? "Time Has Come Today" by the Chamers Brothers.
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. This is for entertainment only, and not for profit.
Chapter 55
"I want the boy," the blue eyed angel in the tan trenchcoat says. "I want the abomination."
How rude. Circe hates the idea of working with these creatures, but she's careful not to show it. She nods slightly instead. "As you wish."
Despite her hidden annoyance, several of the new and improved hellhounds prick their ears up alertly. Their mistress is happy, and that's an emotion they have never sensed from her before. It makes them feel uneasy, but they obediently remain in their places around the shore of the lake.
Still, Circe has every reason to feel proud of herself. She stares at the captive images in the ice around her, but she knows that up above the roof of hell, miles above her head, in that place called Las Vegas, the vaulted Horsemen of the Apocalypse and their mounts have been laid low. Each one is encased in a cocoon of grayish brown leeches. The creatures have flattened out now and molded themselves even closer around their victims.
Curiously enough, the leeches haven't covered their victims completely. On Horseman and Apocahorse alike, only the eyes, blank and unfocused, are left uncovered. There's a reason for that.
The eyes truly are the windows to the soul.
Sam Winchester's eyes spark dark yellow, a faint, glowing ember. The eyes of the rest glow with that well known copper spark, dim and weak.
The leeches are of her own creation, a little amusement she conjured up one day that surprised her with all its possibilities. The abilities that her victims have are hers now. But in order to torment such powerful beings such as these, there's one more touch that's called for.
The purpose of this whole exercise is not to kill, but to make their lives a living hell.
Circe chants.
"Mauris nisi velit, euismod et varius eu, velit nec bibendum tempus…"
Her words flow up into the air, tiny pinpoints of swirling red light. The hounds prick their ears, cock their heads alertly as they crane their necks to watch. The lightshow rises up into the dank redness of hell.
"Integer porttitor viverra tellus, a porttitor leo molestie id. Sed tempor…"
Seconds later the lightshow pushes itself past the concrete in the bus yard. The lights pair off into twos, one pair for each Horseman and each Apocahorse. The lights rise into the air above them, and then downward, pushing deep inside each eye socket, quickly, brutally, with enough force to make Sam, Rika, Chale and Tiesen's backs arch painfully. Ajani, Ishmael, Actaeon and Nahele jerk upwards and then back onto the ground.
Circe laughs. Her eyes spark blood red and their eyes flash blood red in response.
She tilts her head to one side as she considers their hidden fears, laid open before her like the pages of a book. They're linked to her now, exposed and vulnerable. Even in their weakened state, ah, there is still such power in these wayward children!
It's time to play with them a little.
Sam keeps his eyes closed. He breathes slowly, in and out. His head hurts, a low mean ache that's settled down behind his eyes, down his neck and shoulders. His skin feels funny, tingly, and he can't understand why he has this nasty, slimy taste in his mouth. He takes inventory as best as he can, doesn't want to reveal that he's awake. At least, not yet, anyway.
As far as he can tell he still has all his limbs, his fingers, and toes. He's on the ground. Yeah. Feels like concrete. There's movement all around him, but he can't place the sounds.
Then: "Dude. Come on. Quit playing possum. You're not fooling anybody."
Dean.
It's Dean. He sounds calm, even snarky.
Sam actually chuckles to himself. Everything's all right. Dean's here. If Dean's here, then this is over-
Sam opens his eyes. Huh, not such a good idea after all. His head still hurts, and the bright sunlight hurts his eyes even more. But it's not dark outside. It's light. This must be over. They must have won, otherwise why would the sun be out if the world was ending?
Sam blinks.
Everything's yellow.
His vision wavers, but the yellow doesn't go away.
Sam stops the silly business of trying to blink whatever this is away. He focuses on what's important, on the person crouching easily in front of him.
Dean's dressed in worn blue jeans, scuffed brown work boots, that black t shirt. He has his brown leather jacket on, and the collar of the jacket is flipped up, same as always.
A few feet away behind Dean Rika, Tiesen and Chale stand side by side with their horses.
Nobody looks happy to see Sam.
"D-Dean?" Sam croaks. "Wha…what happened?"
Dean's smile is wistful, sad. He spreads his hands wide for a moment. He actually looks apologetic. "Sorry, dude. I was wrong."
Hot breath scorches the back of Sam's neck just as something hard slams into the back of his head and neck. He sees white stars, whole constellations as he face plants into the concrete.
Hit me…he thinks dazedly to himself. Somebody hit me…
The air rumbles like thunder all around him. Sam feels a surge of pure terror as he shakily raises up onto his hands and knees.
It's Samirah.
The huge black Arabian mare walks into Sam's line of sight from his right. She tosses her head angrily as she glares at him with her ears pinned back. Dean sighs as she grumbles wordlessly at him. "Okay. You were right about him all along. I should have listened to you."
"Dean…what's…what's going on?"
Dean shrugs. "I made a mistake. I screwed up, that's what's going on."
Dean stands up, and as he rises his clothes shift into sleek Horsemen black. His eyes blaze copper bright for a second, and Rika, Tiesen and Chale's eyes blaze in response, as do the eyes of all the Apocahorses. "They're my family, Sam. Not you. Not any more."
The Horsemen nod in silent agreement. Nahele refuses to look at Sam. Samirah stands alongside him, and her tense body posture softens as she nuzzles her son tenderly.
"I should have known better, Sam. You can't change what's inside you. I thought you could, but I should have known better to trust you."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Anyway, this is me you're talking to, remember? Dude, don't play dumb. You're not very good at it."
"I don't-"
"Stop it, Sam. You turned on us once we got here. Nearly got us all killed."
"Dean, wait, I didn't…this isn't right-"
Dean rolls his eyes. "Sure it is. You're tainted. Mom died because of you." Dean nods at Sam's hands. "See? You can't hide what you are anymore."
Sam glances down, and his eyes widen in shock. His skin is scaly, pale yellow.
His hands look inhuman now. His fingernails are claws.
Dean shakes his head sadly. He has the look of a man who'd hoped against hope that everything would turn out all right, but he now realizes he hoped in vain. "See?" Dean says softly. "It came out. You can't hide what you really are, Sam. You can't."
Samirah steps up next to Dean, and the huge black horse tacks up in a shimmer of blue light. Dean gathers the reins and swings into the saddle.
"Dean, please, no, wait…."
Dean won't look at him.
The other Horsemen turn and mount up. They won't look at him.
They're leaving him.
"…don't leave me…"
Dean's leaving him.
"…please…don't leave me…"
Samirah wheels around smartly, her ears pricked, eyes bright and alert as she stares at the distant horizon. Rika, Tiesen, Chale and their mounts have the same look.
Dean does too. He won't look in Sam's direction. Sam feels something break inside him. He's filled with the sour taste of fear and loss.
"Dean…please…please don't…" Sam raises up on his knees. He reaches out to Dean, and his hand shakes. His claw-tips skate harmlessly over the black material of Samirah's saddle cloth and over the ankle of Dean's sleek black boot. Dean doesn't react, he doesn't even look down.
None of them do.
Someone chuckles from behind. "Ah, Sammy, you're breaking my heart with this."
Cold steel bites into the thin skin of his neck, and Sam dully realizes that he's wearing a chain collar. He's jerked backwards, and for a moment the chain bites into his skin so tightly that the whole world is blotted out by soft grey that threatens to swallow him up. He can't see, and he can't breathe.
When he comes out of it Dean and the Horsemen are gone.
The man holding the end of the chain around Sam's neck laughs, bright and cheerful. Sam stares up at him in total shock.
"Hello, kiddo. Long time, no see," Azazel drawls cheerfully. "I missed you, buddy."
"No...you can't be…you're dead," Sam gasps. He claws at the chain around his neck, and that doesn't do any good at all.
"It's a day for surprises, now isn't it?" Azazel drawls lazily. "You really hurt my feelings by picking your family over me. After all the good times we had together."
Sam's head rocks back as Azazel strikes him in the face. "Big bro finally left you, huh? Imagine that."
"Yuh…you did something to Dean-"
"Nah." Azazel grins at the backs of the departing Horsemen. "I can't take credit for that. Ol' Deano just got tired of you, Sammy. It happens." Sam's jerked upward and forward until he and the yellow eyed demon are nose to nose. "School's in session now, Sammy. You got some long overdue lessons to learn, boyo."
Another blow to the face, and Sam feels something warm and slick splatter against his skin. His left cheekbone collapses with an audible crunch. Azazel continues to pound him; one bone after another breaks.
Sam doesn't grey out. He doesn't black out either, and that's definitely not a mercy.
He left me. Dean left me…
Castiel wipes blood from his upper lip. His intense blue eyes flash dangerously. He feels emotions he hasn't felt in eons, namely bright, hot rage mixed with hatred.
Sam Winchester doesn't react as Castiel stands over him. The angel draws back his left foot and kicks the Horseman in the face.
Winchester doesn't react to that either. His body jerks, but his eyes remain glazed over. The leeches hold firm.
The witch's tone appears sincere, respectful, but Castiel's not fooled. That insincerity bothers him. The idea that he has to work with these hellish abominations sends a shiver of revulsion through his soul. And to add insult to injury, this one, this demon tainted boy, struck him.
Hurt him.
Castiel's eyes spark with celestial fire. His wings curve darkly around him as he draws back his foot and kicks the Winchester boy again.
It's dark. Chale hears the buzzing first.
He comes back to himself slowly. It takes a moment or so for him to realize that he's on his knees. The first thing he sees is his horse, Ishmael.
Ishmael is dead. Has been for quite some time. Chale can see the horse's skeleton through the thin and tattered grey strips of hide that still cling to the bones. Black flies rise into the air when Chale moves, then they alight on Ishmael again.
No…
More bodies are scattered all over the ground.
Tiesen and his horse Ajani died together. Samirah lies on her side a few feet away, Gaelen slumped over her neck and shoulders.
Sam and Nahele lie crumpled together a few feet away.
No…
Chale shakes his head in disbelief. The bodies look shrunken somehow. The skin looks diseased, dotted with clusters of boils and scabs.
He stares at the building in front of him. It's the Roadhouse. The door is open. Chale doesn't have to look too closely to see Ellen Harvelle's body lying on the floor over to the side.
There's Bast. Bobby Singer. Ash. Rumsfeld2. All lying motionless.
All dead.
No…
Chale struggles to his feet, swaying in place, and he stumbles over the cracked and broken concrete. He doesn't have enough strength to bat the angry flies away from his face. They buzz angrily in the air all around him.
He can still sense life in this place, but it's dying slowly.
Chale finds Rika and her horse Actaeon lying on the ground at the side of the Roadhouse. The white horse is dead. Rika isn't. Not yet. She sits propped up against Actaeon's side. Her head jerks slowly as she realizes Chale's standing over her.
"Sister…" Chale stammers, and she smiles faintly at the word. "What…what happened here?"
"You did, brother…you killed us."
"I didn't…I couldn't…" He falls to his knees next to her, and Rika flinches painfully when Chale reaches out to her.
"You did," Rika whispers faintly. "We came back from that Vegas place. Injured. Hurt. Had to fall back." She swallows thickly. "You tried to heal us. You killed us all instead…"
"I didn't do that. I couldn't…" Chale drops to his knees next to her. He reaches out, takes her slender right hand in his oversized hands.
Rika flinches as he touches her. "Don't…don't touch me…."
Her back arches painfully when he touches her hand. Chale sees the disease and the boils erupt throughout Rika's slender frame. He jerks his hand back, but it's too late. She's gone.
He's the only one left.
All Chale can do is kneel there as the flies buzz angrily around him. He stares at Rika's shrunken face, and only one thought goes through his mind, over and over again.
I killed them. I killed them all…
"Get up. Please…please, get up."
Actaeon won't listen to her. First time in her life she won't listen to her.
Her white horse is so still and quiet there on the ground, and she won't get up. She looks too thin, skeletal, actually, and Rika knows that's not right.
Rika nearly gags at that funny taste in her mouth. It tastes like slimy, rotten fruit, but she can't remember eating anything. The light in the dining room is soft white. She recognizes the place, knows she's back home now, back at the farm. Her eyes hurt too, even though the light in the dining room is soft.
She can't remember how she got there, or when.
There are five people sitting at the table. Rika sways a little as her eyes go in and out of focus. She still can't see too well when her vision finally does clear, but she sees enough. Gaelen. Sam. Chale and Tiesen.
They all look like they haven't eaten in years.
She squints at the fifth man. He's dressed in simple brown clothing, not Horseman armor, slumped back against the tall wooden chair, his mouth open, eyes closed, his skin pulled too tightly over his cheekbones.
"Gaelen?" Rika murmurs. Gaelen's not listening.
None of them are.
Rika glances out of the huge glass window. She sees what looks like large piles of sticks and tattered leather heaped on the ground outside.
It's Samirah, Actaeon, Nahele and Ajani. Rika sees strips of dull skin stretched over sharp edged bones. The horses don't look right, and Rika can't remember what happened.
She can't remember how to fix this.
"Did you see what you did?" comes a voice from behind her. A woman's voice, and Rika staggers a little as she turns around.
Rik smiles. "Momma." Momma and Poppa always loved her, even more so after they found out what she was.
Momma nods sadly. She moves her right hand out from her side, and the knife blade she holds in her hand glints softly as it catches the light. "We thought you were special. We celebrated what you are. We were wrong." Momma nods at the corpses at the table. "Wrong about everything. Wrong about you."
Rika turns and stares at the men sitting at the table, and she blinks in amazement as she finally realizes how wrong she was. She finally recognizes the fifth corpse.
"You killed him," Momma grates out harshly. "You killed your own father…"
Rika backs up a little, but it's too little, too late. She's on her back now, and Momma's on top of her, holding her down, and it isn't fair and it isn't right. She's too weak for this, and she doesn't understand why.
Not my life, Rika thinks wildly. This was Gaelen's life, his family tried to kill him, not me, not me-
"Hellspawn," Momma hisses viciously. She raises the knife and the blade in her hand flashes down, again and again.
So much fun to play with, Circe thinks to herself.
The horror each Horseman endures will go on and on in a loop while Circe turns her attention to the last Horseman. War. He's a special request, in fact; it would not do to ignore this favor. She's aware that with Alastair's death there's a new order in hell. Best not to antagonize anyone, even though this part calls for a little more finesse.
The first thing Tiesen notices is the way his body aches all over. His mouth and throat taste absolutely foul.
He can't sense any of the others. He's totally headblind for the first time in his life.
Tiesen opens his eyes. The weight of his body comes rushing back, and he can tell without looking down at himself that he's wearing his red armor. Even though the sky overhead is still dark and stormy, the glare from the streetlights hurts his eyes. This street corner looks no different from the rest of this place. All concrete and bright lights. Not enough grass anywhere.
Plenty of humans, though.
He's standing in a circle of them. Several hundred of them, by the look of it. Men and women, young and old.
And they all have something in their hands.
Crowbars. Baseball bats. Machetes.
They know what he is. Tiesen's sure of it. He recognizes the look in their eyes, a bright, murderous glint he's seen in the eyes of mankind throughout the ages. Sometimes he was responsible for that look and the death that came with it, some times the humans found their way there all on their own.
"Hello, Tiesen."
Tiesen turns in the direction of the voice. He already knows it's not Ajani, Gaelen, Rika, Sam or Chale.
There's a large moving truck sitting right behind the crowd. The Golden Retriever sitting on the roof of the truck flaps its wings at him.
"Glasya Labolas," Tiesen says grimly.
Damn. Tiesen glares at the humans, stares intently at their eyes. They're not possessed. Not a black eye in the group, and that's a troublesome detail. The pup is a President of Hell, a commander of 36 legions of demons. Why would he come topside and not bring his troops with him?
The dog grins at him. "So you heard of me? I'm flattered."
"Don't be," Tiesen snaps. "What the hell do you want?"
"Want?" That toothy grin gets even wider. "I want to hear you scream. And beg. I've never liked you. You do know that, right?"
This is getting boring. Tiesen rolls his eyes. Best to end this now and find the others.
Tiesen steps forward. "Put your weapons down and get out of my way."
It's his command voice, the one he's used throughout the ages. He can create calm and peaceful feelings if he so desires, could have just as easily told the mob to turn their weapons on themselves, but he's mindful of the fact that they came to this place to save human life, not destroy it.
Of course, if Gaelen, Ajani, or any of the others have been hurt by these bastards, he might have to rethink that quaint notion.
The humans just stand there. They don't stand down. They don't back off.
Damn.
They rush in. Tiesen breaks the nose of the first man who reaches him. He strikes several others, but the rest flow in and roll over him like a tidal wave. He grunts as someone brings a crowbar down on his back. His arms are pinned, and the crowd presses down on his back, forcing him to his knees.
Can't happen like this, Tiesen thinks wildly. Not like this. His power stutters inside him. He strains upwards, but he can't throw them off. One of the crowd hooks their arm around his throat, underneath his chin, forcing his head up and back.
Glasya yips happily. "What's the matter, Tiesen? Ah, it's so sad when the legend falls short."
A shudder ripples through the crowd as they listen to their master's voice. They tremble and quiver like hounds on a short leash.
The demon stands up and paces back and forth. "I've influenced humans all my life, but do I get any credit? Do I get any respect? No. They see this sweet little face of mine and I'm laughed at behind my back. You show up with that armor and that nag of yours, and those bastard brothers and sister of yours, and you get instant respect. No one laughs at you." Glasya sits down and scratches at that spot behind his left ear with his hind leg. "Well. That's all changed now."
Glasya flaps those eagle wings of his once, then twice. "Tear 'em up!"
Tomorrow: Things get even stranger in Vegas; Samirah runs.
