AN: For the record, I'm not planning on putting too much focus on these OCs; it just seemed more interesting to tell this part of the story from their perspective. Enjoy, and maybe review?
Being torn away from his body, even if it wasn't really his, is violation like he's never known. It feels like everything he had is being ripped away from him, but in a physical sense. And he's in his noncorporeal form, a form he's still not really gotten the hang of, being yanked up, up, up, straight through the wood, into the dark sky—and then he plummets downward.
He doesn't even register the shack on the way down, practically immediately it's all just dirt and stone around him, crowding out everything else. It's just darkness, rushing past him faster than anything he's seen, and he can't control his momentum, can't do a damn thing, he's just falling, and worst of all is that he knows where he's falling to.
It gets hotter and hotter the further he descends, and he still has no idea how he can feel temperature or really know anything else about his surroundings when he doesn't have a body, but the unbearable heat reaches him all the same.
Likewise, some sensation commensurate to a rush of adrenaline courses through his non-body as he gains speed. If he had anything to influence physically he would be both screaming and bracing himself every second for impact. But all he can do is receive the inexplicable sensations stabbing into him.
All at once, he crashes with as much force as he's ever been able to muster with the Mark and then some, and all goes not black, but red.
Adelaide hasn't smiled in two days.
Well, Cody hasn't seen much of her in that time, but she always used to smile so often and so vibrantly… the deficiency is noticed. The worst part of all of it was the necessity of covering up the truth, and what they had to do to make the lie believable. Namely, listening through their tears to Walter's instructions, loading Noah's body into the car, driving him to a nearby hiking trail, dropping him over a small cliff—easily the worst part—and calling 911 from there. Walter told them they couldn't bring him all the way home, because the coroner would be able to tell he'd already been dead for over an hour. Neither of them would've thought of that.
They took Adelaide to the hospital to get her wrist looked at. Badly broken. Cody feels guilty for getting out of this without a scratch. He thinks he's distracting himself from the fact that Noah's gone.
The Walshes are falling apart, and why shouldn't they be? When their son, their pride and joy, goes off on a sudden hiking trip with his sister and best friend and doesn't come home again, just because of a little mud and a sudden drop, what else could be expected? The funeral's been scheduled for this weekend. It seems so far away. Endless empty space stretches between them and the event.
Walter blames himself. Of course he does. Even though he couldn't have done a thing to prevent this. They only started hunting because he saved them—not a single thing that's happened has been his fault.
Adelaide, on the other hand, blames the demon.
Cody was over at Walter's house the morning after when Adelaide suddenly turned up at the door, cast on her wrist. As soon as Walter pulled the door open, she said swiftly, "The demon. Emery. Is he dead?"
Walter stood there blinking for a moment, and shook his head. "Demons can't be killed. Only banished. Exorcised. One day, he'll be able to roam the earth again."
"Where is he now?"
He shrugged slightly. "Hell."
Her gaze hardened. "Will he suffer?"
Walter just looked at her for a long time. "Yes."
Dark satisfaction showed in her eyes. She stared down at his welcome mat for a moment. "But not forever," she said.
"Eventually, they always manage to claw their way back up," Walter confirmed. "Just pray that you never have to see him again."
Her expression was so dark, her eyes so empty, Cody had to leave the room.
They live only ten minutes apart, but that was the only time she's been able to get away since it happened. Her family's been staying home, just being with each other. It's just her, her parents, and her twelve-year-old brother now.
Cody's only brother is married and living three states over. The house is generally quiet. For the last couple years his parents have been fine with him leaving the house without telling them where he's going every time, as long as it's within reason, and there are a few stores and the library within walking distance, so it's not difficult to slip out and head next door to spend time with the only person who actually understands what happened to Noah.
Walter's only in his forties, maybe early fifties, and he's in good shape in general, but he has a limp, so it's been a decade since he's done any real hunting, according to him—with the exception of his intervention when Cody brought that spellbook home from a secondhand bookstore he found on vacation in Colorado. His life got really weird really fast, and when he accidentally summoned that spirit just by leaving the book open to a certain page under moonlight, Walter was there just in time to save his life.
Noah was the only other person in the house at the time, and he couldn't keep the secret from Adelaide, or his girlfriend Summer. Cody's pretty sure he never told anyone else; at least, Noah assured him he never did, and Noah's not a great secret keeper but he's no liar.
Was. Was no liar.
Cody knows they need to tell Summer what really happened, eventually. She's called about it more than once. He just can't gather the will to call back.
But this call, this one needs to be made sooner rather than later.
He watches from across Walter's living room as the older man dials in the number he has scratched out in his address book. He sets the phone to speaker and they sit there listening to it ring.
Just when Cody is sure it's about to go to voicemail, a man's voice comes from the phone: "This is Sam."
They share a glance. "Sam Winchester?" Walter clarifies.
"Who's asking?"
"My name's Walter Graham. I heard from Robert Groesbeck that you've been looking for a demon with an immunity to devil's traps. That sound about right?"
"Yes." The voice has turned slightly frantic, but in a controlled manner.
"I'm retired, I wasn't there, but I've got a younger hunter right here who may've found it."
"Put him on," Sam's voice comes without hesitation.
Cody stands and takes a few steps forward, closing the distance between him and the phone. "I'm here, sir."
"Tell me what happened."
He's not messing around. His voice is deadly serious. Cody swallows, wondering what this demon did to him. It had to have been something horrible. Probably at least as bad as what it did to them while bound and covered in sigils and salt. "M-my friend Noah met the demon by chance in a bar this past Friday night," he begins. "Introduced himself as Emery. Noah said he noticed how he grimaced when he saw Noah's cross necklace, so Noah intentionally used God's name in vain, and he flinched. Left immediately after that. Noah tried following him but lost him on the highway after a long drive. So we—um, Noah, Noah's sister Adelaide, and I spent all weekend driving around the area looking for signs of demonic activity or the car that Emery was driving."
"What kind of car?" Sam's voice is tinged with desperation.
"Noah said it was an Impala. Black. I forget the year…"
"1967?" and now his voice is shaking.
"Yeah, that sounds right." Cody pauses, giving Sam an opportunity to ask more questions. But there's silence on the other end, so he goes on, "Anyway, it was definitely providence that let us find it, but Adelaide actually passed the car just as it was leaving a house in a remote neighborhood, y'know the ones with the houses really far apart? Noah and I were driving in my car not too far away, she called us for backup, and well, we found a woman tied up in the shed behind the house. All things considered, she wasn't too banged up, mostly just malnourished and exhausted, but also very very scared. She was pretty hysterical so we didn't question her too much, but we did get a brief description that confirmed that the man who took her was the same man Noah met."
"What was the description?"
"Um, tall, tan, light brown hair. Muscular. Brown eyes, I think."
There's a pause. Cody thinks he hears a long, soft intake of breath. "There's more. You actually came face to face with him. You stayed, didn't you? You stayed and drew a devil's trap."
"Um, yeah. Well, first I drove the woman to the nearest hospital and dropped her off at the front door before going straight back. We painted a devil's trap on the ceiling of the shed, waited for another hour, and then confronted Emery when he came in, after he got caught in the trap. Or at least he looked like he was caught. Looked like he couldn't leave." Cody roughly rubs his face. "But after we came out, he managed to do just that. So I panicked, and I whacked him over the head with my gun.
"While he was out cold, we tied him up good with everything we had—mostly devil's trap duct tape that Walter gave us. And we drew a salt circle. And I started reading an exorcism."
"You exorcised him?" Cody is startled, because in Sam's voice there is suddenly a mixture of panic and anger that Cody can't reconcile.
"Um…" That's the gist. And he doesn't particularly want to recount the rest of what happened to a stranger on the phone. "Yeah. We did. He woke up during it but we got the job done."
"Oh my God."
Cody looks at Walter, who's still holding the phone and returns his glance, an equally confused look sitting upon his face. "That a bad thing?" he cuts in.
Silence on the other end, except the faint sound of heavy breathing. Then, "When did this happen?"
"T-two days ago," Cody answers hesitantly.
"Two frigging days? Why did you wait this long to call?"
"We've had a funeral to arrange," Walter says curtly.
Another pause, this one shorter but filled with no sound at all. "He killed someone?"
"He killed Noah," Cody whispers.
Sam's this close to hyperventilating. His breathing's gotten more and more irregular as the call has continued. "You okay?" Walter asks, not looking particularly sympathetic.
"No, yes, I'm… I'm sorry for your loss." He's immensely distracted; that much is obvious. "Where did this happen, exactly? I see from your area code you're somewhere in West Virginia."
He's good. "Morgantown," Walter affirms.
"Okay. He was in Morgantown, two days ago, and now he's in hell." He sounds like he's talking to himself more than anyone else. "Any idea why he had that girl tied up?"
"All we got from her was a description of the demon's host, sir," Cody answers. "And that's not even relevant anymore."
"Did you get her name?"
"Oh, well um, yeah, her first name was Harper. Don't know about a last name."
"Do you know why this demon is immune to devil's traps, Sam?" asks Walter, his voice somewhat calculating. He's suspicious. Cody gets why, but he's not about to go questioning a Winchester so brazenly.
There's a pause on Sam's end. "I do, but I'm going to keep it to myself. Trust me, though, this demon is the only one of his kind. Look—what's your name, kid?"
"Cody Burke."
"Walter and Cody. If either of you catch wind of this demon again, I want you to call me immediately. Don't hesitate for a second. If he's right in front of you, the best thing you can do is get me on the phone. Give me your exact location if you can. Tell, uh, Adelaide too. Okay?"
"No promises for extreme circumstances like that, but we'll make an effort," says Walter.
"I'm dead serious. It's the course of action that gives you the best chances of survival."
Walter raises an eyebrow, but he says, "All right, all right."
Another short pause, and then the hesitant question: "Was the host still alive?"
"No," says Cody, and his voice breaks unexpectedly. He does his best to clear his throat before going on, "He was dead. Walter called an associate of his to go pick up the body and burn it after we left."
"Right." He's speaking in a rush now. "I gotta go. Make some calls, do some research. Thank you for contacting me. You've been more helpful than you can possibly know."
A click rises from the phone, and the call is dropped.
Walter slides the device into his pocket, shaking his head slowly. "He sounds extremely personally invested in this hunt. That's always dangerous."
"I don't get it," Cody says dubiously. "We sent the thing to hell. Isn't that the best that can be done? Why's he still after it?"
Walter shrugs. "He's a Winchester. He knows a lot of things most hunters don't. Still, though… in this case, I'd like to know too."