Chapter title is from song by Foreigner.

11

Long Long Way from Home - Foreigner

"Yep. Yep. Okay. Will do." Sam hung up the phone and looked thoughtful.

"What did Garth want?"

"Might be a case. A couple of goats have been torn up in Lexington."

"Goats? Garth is worried about goats now?"

"Might be a chupacabra."

Dean leveled him a get-real look. Sam was a horrible liar. Of all the things Garth would call about, a chupacabra was not one of them.

"I know you've been shopping low on the food chain, but don't you think this is a little too low?"

Sam's mouth set stubbornly at being called on what he had been doing.

He tried a different tack. "We're just going to keep batting minor league until stuff craps loose all over everything? Come on, Sam, we can't keep that up. You can't keep that up."

Sam's expression tightened.

"I will if I have to."

Dean leaned back in his chair. He had a hard time believing his ears. Sam seemed prepared to pull the pillow over his head and let the world go to hell in a handbasket. Since Geary, they had hunted a trio of ghosts, a poltergeist, and most embarrassingly of all, a gnome. Maybe the gnome was harassing the family cat when no one was looking, but on the scale of one to apocalypse, it wasn't even worth a mention. Meanwhile, the skinwalkers, shifters, vamps and demons they left to the other hunters, hunters who bled blood and died while they sat in the safety of the bunker and looked for change under the cushions.

Sam turned determinedly back to his laptop again, not looking up, lips set in a thin line. He knew Sam, knew how much this had to be gnawing at him, to have to sit on his hands and let others take the fall. Because he didn't trust Dean's control.

Dean stood, restlessness mixed with the feeling of being tied up in a knot setting in. Sam glanced up, then away again. Dean paced.

"Dude." Sam looked up at last as he rounded the room for the tenth time.

He shot Sam an exasperated look, and took himself off to pace the hallway. He didn't know what Sam had seen in Geary. Didn't ask. All he remembered was what he felt, finding himself an inch from slicing off Cas' head, and having to fight the overwhelming compulsion to do it. He didn't want to, and the part of him that knew he didn't want to seemed small and fragile in the face of the burning Sauron voice on his arm. It would be so much easier to rid himself of the tethers to morality, cut himself loose so there was just one voice telling him what to do.

He sat down on the kitchen table and stared at the coffeepot. There had been a time when Sam had trusted him implicitly, even if Sam had been outraged like a ninny half of that time. That trust was gone, and maybe it should be. It was damn stupid to take your hand off the trigger after you pulled the pin on the grenade.

How was this going to end? How many ways could it end? He could think of a few, and none of them were good.

Sam walked in slowly. He had his 'talk' face on.

"I think we should summon Crowley."

Dean pulled back and blinked, startled by Sam's change in direction.

"Maybe he knows more about the Mark than he's told us, Dean. Maybe there's something else."

Dean pressed his lips together forbiddingly. "And how are we going to get Crowley to talk? We have no leverage."

Sam looked at him steadily, his implication clear.

Dean stood up again, and walked to the far end of the room. "I thought you didn't want me to use my powers."

Sam focused on his own shoe. "No. You were right, Dean. We can't keep this up. What's going on out there…"

Sam's voice trailed off. He took a deep breath, "Roy and Jerry died. Hunting something, Garth wasn't sure what, up in a little town just past Madison. Garth said it's bad out there."

Dean absorbed the news in silence. Garth kept in touch with some folks—it was handy to have someone available to man the phones and look up lore when you were knee deep in a case. Roy and Jerry had been good guys, willing to leave Garth's new wolfy family alone for old times sake. And from the way Sam sounded, they hadn't been the first.

"We need the intel, Dean, and Crowley's the only person I can think of who might have it." Sam sounded resigned.

Dean let his eyes read the label of the cereal box he was standing in front of. The resignation heavy in Sam's voice weighed on him. Stuck between bad choices and worse choices, and having to bend to choose between them because there were no other options—it was not Sam. Given enough time, it would break Sam.

To stall while he thought, he asked casually, "Did you tell Garth about?" He gestured at himself.

Sam looked away. "No. But the word's out."

Awesome. He knew that was bound to happen sooner or later.

"Garth tried to put a good word out. But you know." Sam sounded tired.

"Yeah." He tried to loosen the muscle in his jaw. "Look, Sam. Maybe we should just, I don't know, go our separate ways, huh?"

Sam's head snapped up. "No."

"Sammy." He tried reasoning, although it had never got him much traction before. Between the pre-law thing and the stubborn wheedling Sam could pull, he pretty much lost every argument he tried before he even started. "Don't do this. Don't tie yourself to a sinking ship."

"You're my brother." Sam said stubbornly.

"And now you remember this?" Dean said sharply. "What happened to.."

Sam's expression dared him to say more.

They sat there, a stiff silence taking up the space between them.

"Who else?" Dean finally asked.

"Dean."

"Who, Sam?"

"Jerome. Christa. Ralph." Sam paused in his recital of the hunters they knew who had wound up on the wrong side of Death's ledger. "Jim and Mandy."

Dean put his hand against the upright of the shelf, leaning against it a little. Hunters were not a close bunch by nature, but they kept track. There were always going to be casualties, fact of life, but Jim and Mandy had been good. Very good. He asked the question he'd been dreading.

"Demons?"

Sam looked startled. "Uh, not all of them."

"But some?"

"Dean." Sam sounded like Cas when he said that, all patience and forgiveness.

Dean bowed his head, staring at the Mark on his arm. His short laugh was bitter as he looked at it. He had always thought there would come a time when his watch would be over, and he could rest. Never did he think that Hell would one day make it onto the list of things he had to watch over.

He turned around.

"Let's go have ourselves a little chat with the 'King' of Hell."

"Hello, boys. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Give Sam Ruby's knife back, Crowley."

"Dean, really. Just because the knife can't hurt you is no reason..."

It was easy, really. Crowley's lips kept moving, but no sound came out. It took Crowley another two seconds to realize this, possibly because he loved the sound of his own voice, but the look he flashed Dean was nine parts worry and one part shock, so Dean figured Crowley had known all along the jig would be up someday.

"The knife, Crowley."

Crowley narrowed his eyes with displeasure. Ruby's knife appeared in his hand. THIS KNIFE? Crowley mouthed exaggeratedly as he slid it across the floor. Sam bent to pick it up, sheathing it in his jacket. Dean made a little gesture with his finger and Crowley croaked out a cough.

"Now, Squirrel."

"Seems to me you miscalculated, Crowley." Sam's voice was cold.

"Expediency. I assure you letting that Ginger get the upper hand would have been far worse all around. Isn't that right, Dean? The devil you know, and all?" The assessing look Crowley gave him was shrewd.

He propped his boots up on the table, crossed his arms, and leaned back. Crowley deserved to stew a little bit.

"The keys to Hell, Crowley. What are they?" Sam asked.

The crossroad demon's eyebrows shot up. "Where did you hear about that?"

Sam held silent.

"Not from the redhead." Crowley looked carefully at Sam. "Castiel? No. It wouldn't be news."

Sam tilted his head in a still-waiting gesture.

"Not physical keys, jolly green. And I'm not going to show you."

"Why not?"

"Do I look stupid to you? Suicidal?"

"Then just explain."

"Keys, you big girl's blouse." Crowley made a show of whistling. "Musical keys."

Sam frowned. "Hell has musical keys?"

Dean brought the chair legs down on the floor with a bang. "Hellhounds."

Crowley looked briefly impressed. Sam turned to him for an explanation.

"Whistle that controls the Hellhounds." He looked at Crowley. "Hellhounds play fetch for your souls. All of them?"

"Extra side of slobber."

"What would the…" Sam began.

"Demons going after hunters." He stepped over Sam's question, giving Sam a look before Sam said any more. Crowley didn't need to know everything. Sam took the cue. "That stops now."

Crowley gave him a measuring look. "They're demons, smarty pants. Not angels. They won't fall in line just because you say so."

His answering smile was grim. "Then we'll do a little house cleaning, won't we?"