A?N: So here we go. One more chapter after this one unless I split it. I've made a start on the next story in this series. I hope to get the last of the chapters up before I move. I may not update for a bit after that while I get settled in. In the meantime, enjoy!
Demon?
They left the old camp and headed back toward the city two days later. The time was used to dry meat and fruit as they own supplies wouldn't last them much longer. From the day they arrived on the planet to arrive in the area the ghosts had mentioned had taken them ten days. While weary and wary, they knew that if they used the ship to beam them directly there, once on board, they wouldn't be able to get back down again. Kodos would ensure that. On the way, they made note of the fields of crops. Some seemed to be nothing but overgrown and neglected for the past 20 years, others well maintained. They were near the entrance the ghosts mentioned to the underground city when they were attacked.
"Sam!" Jim heard Bones shout as he tackled the woman to the ground. He did the same thing to Janet Mills, shielding her as the bullets flew. He felt the sting of one as it hit him in the shoulder. Grunting as he pulled himself to his feet, he staggered to haul Mills to hers as well. He stopped trying to get them to cover as more soldiers arrived and surrounded them.
"Freeze, Mr Kirk, or your friends will be killed." One of them stepped forward, and he recognised him as the 2IC from his childhood. Beside him was another familiar face. It was Ry, the kid that had betrayed them so long ago.
"So good to see you again JT, or is it Captain Kirk, now." Ry came forward and punched him hard, Jim just managing to roll enough that it didn't knock him out. It still put him on the ground, and a kick managed to land on his stomach before he could roll away.
"Enough, Bryan. Kodos wants him alive." Red said, coming to stop the man from doing any more damage. He watched as he then turned to the rest of the group. "Is this your crew?" He looked them over as Jim was helped to his feet by Riles.
"I'll go with you." He said without a moment's hesitation, placing a hand over the wound on his shoulder. It felt like nothing more than a graze, but it still hurt like crazy. "Just let them go." He could hear the start of several of them saying something, but Red stopped them.
"Of course, however, she will also be coming." He pointed to Thea which caused Jim to take a step forward, but he was hit in the stomach and was again on his knees. "She killed three of my men back then as well as managing to put a bullet in me, I would love to know how when she was over twenty feet away, without a weapon. Kodos was fascinated when I told him of your abilities." He finished as he looked her over. Jim felt the anger and fear rising in him as he did.
"Fascinated I'm sure, but I doubt he could survive Hell long enough to get them." She said, no trace of fear on her features or in her voice. Jim saw that her brother on the other hand, was afraid. The twins looked at each other in confusion.
"Now now, you can't do anything, I've got guns trained on all of them. You were only able to control one gun at a time, if I remember from our last encounter. As fast as you are, I don't think you will be able to pull them all from our hands before some go off." Red said, standing closer to her, gun pointed between her eyes.
She went slightly cross-eyed a moment before looking straight into his eyes. "It's been twenty years, you think I haven't grown stronger since then?" Then her eyes turned black.
Jim was shocked. The darkness filled them like fog covering a field, covering the greenness with inky black. He could tell the soldiers were shocked too, as they took a step back, all except for Red. He smirked and went to pull the trigger.
He flinched, expecting to hear the retort of the gun. Only he didn't, and from the looks of the others with guns, they weren't having much luck pulling the triggers either. Red now looked slightly worried. Worry that turned to full blown fear as his fingers opened. From his face, he could tell that Red wasn't doing it. The gun, now free from his hand, turned and hovered in front of him; the hammer clicked back. The Captain saw that all the others had done the same thing.
"How?!" Red screamed. He tried to grab it, but he froze as Thea raised her hands; left one pointing palm up at him, the right encompassed the other soldiers, fingers spread apart on both.
"Like I said, I've gotten stronger." Her voice was dark, not a trace of the usual hint of laughter that Jim always heard in it. It was like the ink that had swallowed her eyes also dripped from her words. She looked over the group, head tilted on its side, as though contemplating what to do.
Jim took the moment to look around. The Mills twins wore matching looks of fear on their faces, their hands reaching for phasers. Dean was still looking worried as he stepped between the twins and his sister. The others in their group had confusion colouring their features, much like his own.
"What are you?!" Red screamed as she lifted her hands, causing himself and the soldiers to rise into the air.
She twitched her left hand and pulled him closer. "Something the Fuhrer should have never pissed off." With that, she flung her hands away from herself, sending the soldiers flying backwards in an arc that matched the movement of her hands, until they hit the surrounding trees; some going almost a hundred metres. The guns hovered a moment longer before they pulled themselves apart and dropped to the ground.
Thea stood still a moment, hands still raised before dropping them to her side as she turned away from the direction they had been going in. She stopped again as Janet suddenly stood in front of her, gun raised. Oddly, a silver flask was held in the other hand, her brother beside her in a similar position.
"How?" The voice shook, Janet looking scared, and he suddenly remembered that demons could make eyes go black and fling people across clearings.
"Not here. Fling it at me if you want, it won't hurt me." Her voice sounded resigned, like she had known it was only a matter of time before this secret had come out.
"What are you?" John this time, voice angry and confused.
"The product of a unique set of circumstances." She took the flask from a stunned John and took a deep drink. Capping it, she handed it back before she continued on. "The cave system we used before is nearby." She headed off as she spoke, Dean picking up the clips from the ground before catching up and walking alongside her.
Jim took a moment before he followed, the footsteps of the others fell into line behind him. He wondered at what was going on. How was she a demon? Dean seemed to know, but the other Hunters appeared to be at a loss.
It was several hours later that they were sitting around a fire that Thea had started in the pit they had used a little over a week ago. She and Dean were communicating through a finger meld, his other arm wrapped around her shoulders as she shuddered, they were seated on the stairs leading to the roof. Bones was nearby but seemed to be stopping himself from getting any closer. The siblings were having an intense discussion if the facial features were anything to go by. Dean looked resigned when they broke apart, and worried at the same time while Thea just looked tired; she struggled to keep her eyes open. He was sitting with Scotty on one side Spock beside him followed by Riley with John on the other, his sister beside him.
"Mills, do you know what's happening?" He asked the Hunters, as this was their thing.
"No, if she was a demon, there would be no way she could move around the ship like she can." Janet said, leaning forward slightly to see the captain.
"Not even the most powerful of demons can escape the devil's traps we have scattered around the ship. And Sam doesn't know where all of them are. None of us do just in case." John said, not taking his eyes off the three on the other side of the cave.
"What Sam drank is simply Holy Water. Demons burn when they come into contact with it. Even powerful ones." Janet said, handing a flask to him. He took a drink, it was simply water.
Jim turned back to them just as they stood and made their way over to the fire. John had caught a deer-like creature and they had most of it roasting over the fire. The Mills twins had set the standard shielding spell in the area, so no one would be able to stumble across them.
"Like I said before, a unique set of circumstances. As you know, I'm a Winchester."
"So's Dean." John said, and Jim noticed as he lent forward, he still had a gun in his hand. "Can he do whatever the hell that was?" The gun was waved around indicating her.
"No, for two reasons. One, he's not half Vulcan." She paused and looked guilty.
"And two?" Janet prompted. She had shifted slightly, and was now closer to her, despite her brother's hand on her arm, stopping her.
"Two, he's never been to hell."
"What? When?" Both Hunters asked, shock in their eyes. They weren't the only ones. Himself, Spock, Scotty, Riley and Bones were also startled.
"I'll start at the beginning. As you know," looking at the twins, "Both brothers had been to hell numerous times throughout their lives. Dean after making the deal to save Sam; Sam when he was possessed by Lucifer. They are the two most notable ones. Not to mention, Sam was pulling demons from meatsuits for a while, even if he was hopped up on demon blood, while Dean had the Mark of Cain." She took a breath and a drink offered by Dean. Jim remembered that from reading the journals. He and the rest of Alpha had read them over the years, so anything they talked about would be understood if they mentioned something.
"Because of that, their DNA changed slightly, not a lot, but making deals and ending up in hell only to be pulled out for whatever reason seems to be a Winchester thing. Almost every generation has done it at least once, and because of that, the changes have been getting slightly stronger. I managed to do it by accident when I was fifteen, freaking Dad out."
"When he released that I wasn't possessed, he realised what it was. He spent just over a hundred years in hell when he was younger after making a deal to save his Dad. One that changed when his Dad finally found and made a deal with a stronger demon. But that was it, just enough changes for it to manifest in me. I wasn't able to do it again, even when we trapped a demon and had him try and teach me things."
"So there are demons that know?" John looked worried at that.
"What do you think?" Jim had the feeling that the demon hadn't lasted long after that.
"Here was the only other time I was able to use the ability, and I think that was again after someone I cared for was hurt. After my own 150 year stint in hell before I joined Starfleet, I found it easier to do this. I've been practising ever since I returned topside."
"What?" The word was getting well used today by everybody.
"Wait," Jim asked, putting a hand up to stop anyone from saying anything, he was confused. "What do you mean '150 years'? You said you joined Starfleet shortly after all this." He waved a hand to encompass the planet.
"One month topside, is equivalent to ten years in Hell." John said, looking at her in awe.
"We always wondered what happened to you for all those months." Janet said, sliding closer and wrapping her arm carefully around her shoulder, her brother's hand falling from her as they realised the enormity of what she did.
"Dad was close to catching one hell of a nasty creature, but then he got hurt. Badly enough that he would have died, so I made a deal. I asked for him to be healed, long enough for him to find and take out the creature. I would be in Hell for however long it took. I managed to get him to hospital once I returned before he bled out. For all the good it did, he was killed just a few months later by the ghost."
"You make it sound like a walk in the park." Scotty said, noticing the calmness with which she was talking about it all.
"I know the layout of hell from all the journal's written by the brothers and other family members that have been down there, so, after escaping from where they had me, I hid out. I know the ways out, but I kept my end of the bargain. It still wasn't easy. Let's just say that I won't be melding with anyone for a while in any form." She shuddered, and Jim noticed that her brother did the same. He got the feeling that she wouldn't be sleeping well for a while either.
"What happened to Dean? He would have just been a wee lad then?" Scotty asked, looking at the younger Winchester.
"Mum was still looking after me then." Dean spoke up as he started to cut the deer up. The meat was flavoursome and filling. "I didn't know about any of that until she started to work for Starfleet. It was one of the things she looked into when she heard about the black eyes."
"Checking to see if they were descendants?" Jim watched as Scotty took a plate from Dean as he handed them out.
"Yeah, just in case. Nothing but demons."
"So, what actually happened in that creek bed?" Riles asked. Jim remembered her telling them that she had beaten them up, but he couldn't remember hearing anything that day.
Sam told them, changing a few things back to what had actually happened.
Sam stopped Riles from racing out, almost blanching at the emotions she picked up from the brief contact on his arm. "You going out there will do nothing." She hissed. Spotting an uprooted tree, the ground and exposed roots forming a nice hollow, she tugged and pushed him into it as she said, "Wait under here. I'll get him."
"How? There are seven of them. That gun won't do much when it runs out of bullets."
"Leave that to me." She had a hidden trick up her sleeve, one that not many people knew about. Shoving the kid into the hole and leaving the bag she had filled at the outpost with him, she then made sure that he would stay there, no matter what.
She belly-crawled away from the group, until she couldn't see them, then stepped back into the creek. As she approached the group, she took a moment to look at the situation from the safety of the shadows and a bend in the creek. JT was on the ground, holding his side and looked to be unconscious. Sam could see the blue plant shirt had been torn off and a red stain was covering his side. She heard the 2IC berating the others for hurting him. They're going to have a lot more to worry about in a minute. She thought, as she stepped into their view, her anger and fear filling her.
"Leave him alone." She said, her voice low, commanding, without fear. She could tell the moment they realised that they weren't dealing with a normal person. She knew why; she had let her anger at the past several months come forth, let her eyes turn black. She remembered the feeling from many years before when she had last felt the same burning anger. She flung her hand at them as they raised their guns to her, as though backhanding a comment away. Only it sent them flying several dozen meters down the creek bed. She started to walk toward JT, she stopped when she saw movement from one of the soldiers.
"What are you?!" Red cried as he stood before he stumbled away from her slightly, drawing a gun hidden behind his back. He screeched again as the gun he had been holding was wrenched out of his hands with a tug of her mind and a pantomime move from her hand. It was difficult to describe what she was feeling when she did this. It was like every evil thought raced through her head and out her hand, obeying her wishes.
"The fact that even I don't know, should be answer enough." She raised her hands and managed to get a hold of everyone that had stood again, she lifted them slightly before she tossed them again further down the creek bed and some over the bank. She heard the solid thud of several of the men as they struck trees and broke branches and knew that several wouldn't be standing again. She felt something trickling from her nose, and when she wiped at it, her hand came away green. Suddenly, she staggered slightly, the energy required taking it's toll, and she fell to her knees as she reached JT and picked him up. She had noticed that he had fallen unconscious just as she stepped out, so there was no chance he had seen anything.
"I don't know what you are, but we will find you, all of you. And when we do, the Fuhrer will dissect you, and have the boy." Red had managed to get his feet under himself again and was holding another gun on her.
"The Fuhrer has three days until Starfleet arrives. Can he achieve his Riche by then?" She was pleased with the look of surprise that crossed his face that someone knew of the plan. As she held JT to her hip, his head flopped onto her shoulder; she mentally tugged a gun from behind her own back and had it in front of her within seconds. She then mentally pulled the trigger. "Somehow I doubt that."
As he was down, she didn't bother to check to see if she had killed him. She was struggling with the memories from the blood that was coming from JT's wound, which meant it had opened again. She needed to tend to it as soon as possible. Securing the gun again, she held JT more securely to her and headed toward the fallen tree where Riles was hidden.
"What happens now?" Riley asked, when she finished her story. "When those guys wake up, they're going to tell Kodos what happened."
"They won't wake." Thea said, laying down and turning from the group. Jim got the sense that not only had she thrown them, but she had also killed them and he also felt that that was the end of the matter for the night, for which he was grateful. He didn't know what else was going to happen.