Song Remains the Same

Chapter 144 / Thunderstruck

"You better start swimming or sink like a stone, cause the times they are a-changing."
— Bob Dylan

The tiny bar was grungy and mazelike with a distinctly seedy feel, despite being built into a quite lovely historic building downtown. Right after entering into the short hallway that led toward the main area, Sam and Alex stopped abruptly on a dime, mutually recognizing the current karaoke participant by voice alone. In disbelief, they listened to their missing brother singing with gusto, off key and in too low of a register for the song.

"She's my cherry pie, cool drink of water such a sweet surprise, tastes so good makes a grown man cry, sweet—cherry—pie!"

After a second of shock, Alex charging forward blindly into the main area, temper gone hot. She barged past the bar itself and then by some tables and booths, knocking over an empty chair or two as she made the beeline for the tiny stage. If she'd been paying attention, she would have seen Meg trying to flag her down from a dim corner, but there was only thing in Alex Winchester's sphere of vision: Dean, inexplicably carefree and singing with a bottle of beer in one hand and mic in the other. She marched up onto stage and snatched the microphone out of her brother's hand so hard and far that the AV cables ripped clean out of the machine—with a loud whine of feedback, the bar went silent.

"What the hell are you doing?!" she bellowed, because this was a slap in the face: she and Sam had spent the past three weeks torturing themselves over their brother's condition, worrying if he were alive or dead—and here he was, drunk and dicking around?! Faintly, Alex registered a few people commenting things like 'thank god' and 'can't sing for shit' and 'terrible song choice anyway.'

Dean, who had his hair styled in a wild way he had never worn it in before, reacted to his sister's sudden appearance by becoming instantly disgruntled. "What's it look like?" he retorted sourly. "Putting Robert Mason to shame, that's what." His expression pinched insolently as he brushed at his rust-red shirt—which had beer sloshed onto it from her rough swipe of the mic. "Until youruined it." He rolled his eyes and made to move, tossing the beer carelessly over his shoulder to shatter. "Outta my way." He brushed past—so startlingly hard that she nearly lost her balance and had to stumble to catch herself.

Dean reached the bottom of the stage stairs only to run into his brother, who was heaving from his heavy, impassioned breaths. "Explain yourself, now," Sam demanded dangerously, hovering between angry and concerned. "What is this, a psychotic break? Drugs?"

Dean seemed genuinely amused at the suggestions. "Ah, you wish," he replied lightly, then chuckled. "Loosen up a little, Sammy! Where's your sense of adventure?" He patted his brother on the shoulder then swept past, headed straight for the bar.

"My sense of a—" Sam repeated incredulously as his sister got to him. Together, they watched in aghast bewilderment as Dean walked into the employee's section of the bar and grabbed an entire bottle of whiskey for himself off the supply shelf. He drank straight out of it.

"Sir, this area is employees only—" the bartend sputtered. "And you really can't do that!" With his fun ruined, Dean lowered the bottle and stared menacingly. Brave and foolish, the bartend shrunk nervously. "Y-you gonna pay for that?"

As answer, Dean put the bottle to his lips again, finished the entire thing in a huge guzzle, then made a refreshed sound and then gave a very ominous smile. "Now just why in the hell why would I pay, bub?" he asked, then swung the dense glass bottle at the poor guy's head—knocking him down in a daze as shattered glass went flying. The second bartender, a few feet off, screamed. At the violent outburst, the few patrons in the bar fled en masse.

"Cowards," Dean muttered through a chuckle as he watched the people he'd alarmed stampede to the exit. Without any concern, he tossed aside the jagged remains of the bottle neck he'd used as a weapon and began to study all the alcohol lining the shelf in front of him. The second bartender helped the one Dean had attacked up, and they fled together after the last of the guests.

"…He's off his fucking rocker," Sam breathed in horror, stuck in place.

With an identically dismayed expression on her face, Alex could barely find her gutted voice. "What did Crowley do to him?"

"I mean, maybe this is a full mental break," Sam whispered, and the two exchanged a brief glance in the now silent bar—with everything their brother had been through, it wasn't the craziest theory, but it just didn't quite fit. They needed more information.

Dean perused the bottles with interest, tossing the ones he didn't want down on the floor. "Dean," Alex said loudly, but he ignored her. She ramped her voice up in volume. "Dean!"

He turned angrily. "What?" Sending an impatient look at both of them, he gestured for them to get on with it and say what they had to say. Apparently he had more pressing things to attend to than his bewildered, upset family members.

"What do you mean, 'what'?" Sam asked, fully disturbed and desperate. "Dean! Seriously, please! We've been looking for you for weeks now, Jamie and Rose are worried!" He indicated himself and Alex. "We're worried! Cas, Bobby, and Kevin too!"

Dean got this cold glint to his eye as a smile that could only be called lofty curved his mouth. "Aww well isn't that just so sweet." Something about his voice was bone chilling. He exited from behind the bar and swiped up an abandoned, unopened bottle of beer and cracked it open with his teeth, spitting the top out to clatter away on the floor.

Sam wet his lips and approached carefully, trying a different tactic. "Look, Dean—it's time to come home. And then we can work through all of this somehow. Whatever it is you're going through, whatever's…" he tried to find an accurate descriptor, "going on… we'll figure it out. Okay?"

Dean's amusement was offensive in the face of Sam's earnestness. "Oh yeah?"

Severe now, Alex pulled out the zip-ties she had in her jacket, deciding it was time to make it clear. "You're coming with us peacefully, or in these, so which one is it?"

Dean took one look at the plastic binds and full out laughed—the kind of laugh that reverberated and caused him to exhale with satisfaction afterward. "Good one, Al," he said after a minute, still indecently amused. "Sweetie, it'll take a whole hell of a lot more than those dinky little ribbons to hold something like me." He moved toward his siblings in such a way that Sam immediately skirted a little closer to his sister to protect her. Dean's attention turned to him. "And who are you kidding, little brother? 'Work through it all'? Like one, big, happy family?" Dean seemed disinterested and dismissive, but also mocking. "That ain't us. It's never been us." He smirked and folded his arms, settling into his stance with a brazen, uncharacteristic confidence. Dean blinked. And then the last thing Sam and Alex had ever expected happened: their brother's eyes went solid black as midnight. "Especially not now." Their reactions were immediate, as you can imagine: dismay, shock, fear. And Dean, still black-eyed as sin, ate it up, enjoying it immensely. "Ah man, the look on your faces!" he cackled gleefully.

Alex found her voice first and spoke to her twin sidelong in a terrified whisper. "How is he possessed?"

Dean was chuckling. "Oh honey," he patronized, pulling his shirt aside to show his intact demon ward, further horrifying and scaring his confused siblings. "That's a cute theory."

Behind them, Meg's grim voice announced her lurking presence. "He's not possessed. He's straight up demon, all the way through."

Sam was gutted. "…What?"

Dean was pleased with himself. "It's like the black-eyed bitch says," he said breezily. "I'm all demon, zero Dean Winchester. Get with the times, chumps."

He then decided he was bored and brushed past them to return to stage where he fiddled with the karaoke machine as Sam and Alex remained in a petrified trance of alarm.

"How?" Alex breathed, then shook her head, getting furious and looking at the first person she knew to defy. The one who had told them. "No, no! That's not possible!" she insisted angrily at Meg.

"Look, I don't know how, Peaches, but I recognize a full blooded demon when I see one!" the demon hissed back. And even Meg seemed a little afraid.

"Is… is this a bad joke?" Sam asked, having a hard time speaking as he stared at his brother. "What's going on here?"

Dean clapped the karaoke machine on its side, like a good jostle would make it work again. "What's going on is that I'm alive, Princess," he declared, not even bothering to look at either of his siblings. "For the first time in… well, ever. I'm on top of the world, and nothing's dragging me down." His eyes flicked up to look into theirs, and his gaze darkened. "Especially not you two boneheads." While he'd been annoyed and cavalier up until now, he had an edge of anger and maliciousness building. He abandoned the karaoke machine in favor of standing up, settling his weight into his feet, and crossing his arms. "You really think I wanna go back to that schmuck of a guy again? In what reality would anyone wanna be Dean Winchester, huh? Endless bullshit, unsolvable problems, a life of babysitting two dumbasses—nothin' ever went right for that useless punk. All he was good at was daddy issues, alcoholism, and hating himself." He raised his beer at them, showing that the only thing left from that list he thought was worth keeping. His eyes, narrow and needly, swept from brother to sister then back again. "Do you know how miserable you both made him? How much of a thorn you were in your precious big brother's side? You held him back, and he let you—'cause he was a miserable, spineless son of a bitch who didn't know who he was without you." He cracked a sudden, disarming grin and spread his arms wide proudly. "Well look at me now!"

"Trying not to," Meg gritted out balefully.

It was sickening, and neither of his siblings could find words.

Dean took a hard pull of his beer then discarded it onto the floor with another crash. "Look gang, it's been real, but I'm out." He moved down the stairs off the stage.

Alex found her feet and moved forward fast, confronting him brusquely. "You're not going anywhere." Her voice trembled. Behind her, Sam stood close.

Dean regarded her warningly, eyes dropping to her protruding stomach. "You should be more careful about poking the bear, being pregnant and all."

While the comment was chilling, it also gave her a fraction of hope. Alex's eyebrows rose into a challenging expression. "I didn't think a demon would care either way about hurting a pregnant woman."

Her words visibly pissed him off—but again, he didn't attack either of them. "Look, I definitely don't mind killing either of you, so don't tempt me, okay?"

Alex kept goading him, trying to find a glimmer of her brother left in there. "If you don't mind, then why haven't you tried?"

His jaw clenched, and she wasn't sure if he was feeling called out or murderous—or maybe both. "Call it old times' sake," he growled darkly.

Gaunt at his sister's side now, Sam was more blunt than she'd been: "Dean, we know you're still in there."

Dean swaggered into Sam's space, almost chest-to-chest. "Oh yeah?" he breathed with a faint sneer. "Well you're dead wrong, bucko. I'm in here. Your brother Dean Winchester is gone. And I don't want anything to do with your little hunting life, I'm not coming back to your pathetic little bunker, and tell the chick and her kid nice knowin' ya. I ain't nobody's daddy, hear me?" He poked a hard finger into Sam's chest before he pointed a warning finger at Alex. "And if either one of you try and mess with me again, I'll kill you both, capeesh?" His eyes silently threatened Sam a moment longer, and then he made to brush past—but Alex got in his way again, refusing to give up. Dean went stiff as a board, his eyes cold as ice. "Outta my way, little girl," he threatened darkly.

Scared shitless, she remained defiant. "No."

There was a brief hesitation, then an ugly look descended and Dean lunged. However, Sam had been ready, and narrowly managed to jump into the gap. Knocked over from the force of the ruckus, Alex fell back onto her butt and elbows as her twin took the brunt of Dean's assault—a brutal right-hook to the face that sent a stunned Sam to the ground. Even as Sam blinked woozily and Alex jumped across his body to shield him instinctively—she realized Dean wasn't continuing the assault. He was just standing above them with a calculating little smirk on his face at the disbelief on their faces.

Sam touched shaking fingers to his face. "He broke my nose," he murmured incredulously, blood already running down from his nostrils and splitting an angry red line across the bridge. The siblings stared at each other in horrified disbelief, then up at Dean.

"Get up and see what happens next," he suggested ominously. Neither one did—Sam grabbed ahold of Alex's arms as if he was going to physically hold her down there with him if he had to—but she didn't try and get up. Pleased, Dean smirked again. "Yeah, that's what I thought." Triumphant, he saluted irreverently and bid them goodbye. "Adios. Seeya never." And just like that, he disappeared into thin air, leaving two absolutely confounded siblings behind.

Shifty-eyed and furtive, perhaps afraid of a sneak attack, Meg came over and grabbed one of Alex's hands, hauling her up and then the both of them pulled Sam to his feet. No one said anything—until Meg frowned and squinted into the shadows, seeing something new. A lone patron who hadn't left the shadowy corner booth when everyone else fled.

"Hey, don't look now, but there's Daddy Warbucks," she muttered with distaste, and both Winchesters turned to look, not sure what she meant until they saw him: leaned over the table with a vapid look on his face and about thirty empty drinks crowding his table… Crowley. He looked dingy and unbathed, not to mentioned absolutely off his face.

The second Alex recognized him, murder descended across her features and she charged over like a bull without a second thought. Sam was already racing after her. "We need him alive, Alex!" he shouted.

Crowley's dull eyes rose in a fog, registered recognition, and quickly bulged. He instantly realized what was happening despite being so intoxicated. "No murdering, no murdering!" he insisted frantically, cowering back into the booth with pitiful hands raised in self-defense. In the nick of time, Sam caught Alex into a strong bear-hug she fought against tooth and nail. "I saved your brother!" Crowley insisted desperately as Alex writhed valiantly, mere feet from him.

"He doesn't look saved from shit!" Alex screamed back, then managed to break the hold Sam had on her—and while she was still absolutely furious, she didn't proceed to attack Crowley. Instead, she let Sam put an arm out in front of her as she continued to stew in rage and hatred, her eyes like a wild animal, her cagey stance like a mother bear whose cub had been taken from her.

"Explain, now!" Sam demanded, every bit as murderous as his sister.

"Look, your brother was dead, okay?!" Crowley explained in out-of-character alarm. "Until I made sure he wasn't!"

That certainly hadn't been what they expected to hear, and mutually gone still in confusion, the twins listened as Crowley bumbled along, tripping over his words as his spastic movements made him look like a tweaker on the streets. "He, he gutted Abaddon with the First Blade, had a very touching family reunion, left me for dead—you'd be so proud—then came back because the airhead forgot the Blade in all his exuberant joy or, or what have you. I'm supposing he felt bad for his ole mate Crowley, heh, 'cause when he came back for the weapon, he dug the bullet out that was keeping me stuck." Strangely sick and sad looking, Crowley looked almost regretful, like a sudden thought had occurred to him. "…Looking back, might have been the decision that got him killed…" he reflected softly, shaking his head and looking distinctly sad."And then right after, some rogue angel showed up and smote him out of the blue." It looked like the demon was experiencing pain to remember it, which Sam and Alex both balked at. "What?" Crowley asked in prim discomfort. "It still bothers me to think about." He refocused uncomfortably. "Anyway. I… happened to be aware of certain things, as I'm oft known to do: When a human with the Mark of Cain dies in possession of the First Blade, it resurrects them. Just… not as a human anymore." He made a face, indicating that he felt despondent and annoyed. "I think you gathered as much." He pulled an empty glass over, surveying the drop or two of alcohol left inside longingly. "Allow me to be stark, raving honest: I quite despise this version of your brother. He's terribly generic and brutish. No class, no vision. Just wants to swan about and subject me to places like this." He sighed lengthily, as if he were the lone victim here.

"Oh well isn't that so sad for you," Alex snapped. "How do we get him back, Crowley?!"

The King's dreary, drugged eyes rose slowly from the glass, as if he'd never wondered such a thing. "Uh…"

"Just look at him," Sam muttered scornfully. "Pathetic."

Meg, who'd stood back with arms folded and narrowed eyes, finally drifted closer. "Have you even been to Hell recently?" she asked tightly. "Have any of your minions seen the state of you? How do you even know if there hasn't been some full scale mutiny or something, you flighty little dingbat?"

Crowley looked at her oddly as if just now noticing her. "Why're you here?"

"Answer the question, Crowley," Sam insisted forcefully. "Why are you up here like… like this instead of down under?"

There was a guilty, deceptive shift of the eyes. "I'm on holiday, and don't fancy going home just yet," he muttered defensively, then became a touch resentful. "No thanks to you two and the malarkey you subjected me to at that little church a few months back." He sighed out, staring blankly into one of the empty glasses on his table. "Ah. Bygones." His stare was blank on the glass. "I think I'm depressed."

Having had enough, Alex snapped. She lunged across the table, breaking a ton of glasses in the process as she throttled Crowley by his lapels. "How—do we get—him back?!" she shouted.

Crowley blinked innocently, cringing, as if he hadn't even considered that. "Well, I suppose you don't."

Alex shoved him. "Not an option!" Like he were woozy, Crowley landed in a sideways, half sitting lump.

Outside, the faint wail of police sirens could be heard, and all four of them heard it at the same second.

"Should we take him back with us?" Sam asked his sister with quiet urgency.

Disdainful, Alex glared down her nose at the fallen King. "Not even Hell wants him, why do we?" Crowley had the audacity to look hurt by her words.

"We gotta bounce," Meg said—the sirens were becoming louder, and she was already on her way toward the back where a bright red EXIT sign glowed.

Sam went to follow—and Alex started to, then realized no way in hell was she gonna leave Crowley sitting there no harm no foul. She turned on her heel, charged across the few steps, grabbed Crowley by the front of his wrinkled suit, and sucker punched him across the face as hard as she could with a shout of unmitigated rage. That's when a very interesting thing happened: not the look of dismayed betrayal on Crowley's stupid face, not the stinging and smarting of the knuckles on Alex's fist. No, the intense Braxton Hicks contraction that came on so sudden and intense that Alex doubled over, crying out in surprised pain as one hand clapped to her stomach, and the other smacked down onto the table for support. Only, the table was littered in pieces of broken glass at that point, which only made her pain spike more profusely.

"…What's happening?" Crowley asked in confusion, blood running out of his nose as his eyes went from Alex's face to stomach and back a few times. He almost sounded worried.

Alex pointed a bloody, silencing finger at him with her free hand as she gritted her teeth and endured the contraction with a mixture of alarm and fear. Sam had rushed back to her side by now.

"What's happening?!" he demanded, gone pale as he tried to ascertain what was going on. Seeing her hand on her belly, he understood quick enough. "You okay? Can you walk? We gotta go!" he urged hurriedly, worry making his young face tight.

She nodded, unable to speak for the moment, and with her brother helping support her, she hobbled full speed with him toward the back exit. Once in the alley, they went a little further to where Meg waited, then Sam stopped them and braced his sister with two hands, looking her over closely in alarm.

"You okay?" he asked urgently. "What's happening? Do you need a hospital?" He noticed her bleeding palm and got even more worked up. "What's this blood from?!"

"Cut my hand on the table," Alex gritted out through a grimace as the last of the contraction finished. "I'm fine," she insisted, although truth be told, she was beyond shaken up. "That was one of the contractions I told you about before. That one was just… really intense." The most intense one she'd experienced, in fact.

A terrible determination overcame Sam's face, born out of fear for his twin's wellbeing. "We gotta get you back to the bunker," he said brusquely. "And Cas needs to stop dicking around with this angel crap." He urged her onward, ignoring Meg as he steered his sister down the alley to reunite with the car and get the hell out of that place. "Come on."

Too overwhelmed to do anything but automatically fall into step with him, Alex glanced back over her shoulder at a grim-faced Meg briefly before she returned her eyes to the path in front of her as it repeated in her mind over and over again: My brother is a demon…

Eyes began to fill with shocked tears. And nothing was right in the world at all.

Later

Stunned, the Winchesters could say little as they drove away from that bar, outside of Sam asking once more if Alex needed medical attention. She said no. And then the great silence commenced, in which both stewed and dismayed over the unbelievable news they had discovered. A few terse comments were shared—but the shock was so great and Sam's anxiety so high that Alex ended up going completely silent. Exhausted, defeated, feeling like a scared kid, all she could do was stare out the window with a tight chest and shallow lungs as she asked herself over and over again how this unthinkable scenario had happened. She clenched her bleeding hand up into a tight ball—the physical pain was nothing in comparison to the mental agony that began to typhoon over her. The image of her beloved oldest brother smiling with dead, all-black eyes destroyed her heart—and it felt too surreal and wicked to be true. It was like some nightmare come to life, and nothing made any sense. Unavoidably, she blamed herself. Both numb and excruciated, Alex retreated emotionally, glazing over as her mind struggled to put any sort of coherent thought together. At some point unknown, the emotional defeat paired with her fatigue must have won out and she fell into a restless, nightmare filled sleep as the Impala sped toward the bunker under a dark, rainy sky.

In dreams, her yellow-eyed father and black-eyed brother jeered and howled laughter, promising that she and Sam were next. Terrified, Alex ran through shadowy wilderness for miles, screaming for Sam—she could hear his agonized cries for help, always just out of reach. He was nowhere to be found, no matter how much she wailed his name. And then deep in her belly, sharp stabbing pains made her stumble and fall as terror coursed through her veins. No, not now! This baby cannot come now! Her mind spun in panic as a scream—her own scream—deafened her. And then out of the obscurity, Lucifer suddenly boldly stepped into view, his smile haughty.

With a huge terrified gasp, Alex snapped awake, rocketed upward, and found herself in a quiet, dark, unmoving car. Disoriented, the first thing she realized: Sam was not in the driver's seat.

Doubly alarmed, Alex's rattled senses sharpened fast as she took quick visual inventory with panicked, racing eyes: they were pulled over onto the shoulder of a rural highway. It was no longer raining. And to her vast relief, Sam was right there pacing in front of the car on the phone, talking with animated near-anger in the wash of the Impala's headlights. Shaken, Alex opened her door, and then could make out what was being nearly shouted:

"Just get your ass back to the bunker, pronto, I don't care what you have to do! Just make it happen, Cas!"

Understanding dawned and Alex heaved a jarred exhale to soothe her jangled nerves. She told herself that was just a bad dream—then exited the car stiffly as Sam hung up and saw that she'd woken. An awkward silence commenced, in which Alex stared kind of blankly, her pulse still racing. She glanced at the phone in her brother's hand, slightly irritated. "I was gonna do that."

"Not soon enough," Sam retorted kind of forcefully, then realized he was being harsh and sighed in frustration, composing himself. "Sorry. I just… I just couldn't stop thinking about it." He looked beaten down—both literally and figuratively. Tired, glum, and now with a gashed nose and bruising eye. "And you know what else I can't stop thinking about?" He squared himself to Alex, letting her see how upset he really was. In the glow of the Impala's headlights, his eyes glinted. "What we'll have to do if we can't fix him."

My god. It felt like Alex was plunged into ice water. Her throat constricted. Her stomach plummeted. And she shook her head immediately, refusing to even consider such a scenario. "It won't come to that."

The way Sam asked her was both genuine and challenging. "How do you know?"

She didn't know, and her outburst showed how fucking terrified, exactly, she was: "Because we'll figure it out, Sam!" Her veins hammered with distress and she had to put a hand on her forehead then run fingers through her hair to channel the emotion she was feeling.

Sam was quiet. Defeated. Hesitant. "And what if we don't?" he asked, crushed and hopeless. "After a lifetime of 'figuring it out,' what if this is the time we don't? What if Rose grows up without her dad, Alex?"

She shook her head even harder than before, almost angry at him now. "That's not an option!" she spat insistently… but she knew it absolutely was.

Sam regarded her sadly. "…Don't you think I wanna believe that?" She could hear the tears gathering in his voice. He looked skyward into what had become a clear, star-speckled sky overhead. "It's just—" he whispered, looking both childlike and elderly at the same time as his eyes scanned back and forth across the expanse. "Angels are out there gunning for all of us… my dad ran out on his family again… my little sister's pregnant with a baby that might kill her… I was possessed by a rogue halo for two months… and now my brother's been turned into a demon." There was a long, hollow pause in which both of them just stood there—Sam near tears and Alex trying to push away the feeling of absolute despair. "I mean, Dean died, Alex," Sam trembled out, and she had to screw her eyes shut against the unbearable agony that statement made her feel. "Thinking we hate him." It truly did feel like a knife in her heart, and Alex's shoulders lost their strength, sagging. Her armor began to crack. "It's all too damn much," Sam whispered in tears, lost and dazed. "It's…" he trailed off vacantly. "I don't even know what to think right now. Except that we're all screwed." Regret and indescribable pain colored his features as his unfocused eyes found his sister's devastated face. "And I'm sorry, because the last thing you need is your big brother dumping all his problems on you right now."

She shook her head once more, but this time it was gentle. And she drifted closer, swallowing down the unknowns and pain as best she could. "Sammy," she said, her unsteady voice bearing a note of pleading. "You can always tell me anything." Their eye contact held, and she let him see how petrified she was. It felt impossible to know how to make it through this or encourage him, but she had to try. "Listen to me—we can't do what we always do and lose our shit when Dean's in trouble. We need to talk about this. We need to face it together. We don't have any other options. We can't give up." She said this as much to him as she did to herself.

Understanding crossed his familiar face at the unspoken reference to the last time they'd lost Dean and gone separate ways after fighting explosively. He nodded bleakly, while his face worked against vast fear and foreboding. "You… you scared me today," he whispered. "Ever since you and Cas told me everything about the baby… I've been having nightmares." About losing you, was the implication. Alex's face slackened in concerned surprise and Sam tried a haggard little smile through his emotions. But the smile didn't hold. "…I'm terrified to lose the only family I have left, Alex." His expression struggled valiantly and she nodded numbly, understanding that fear too well. Her eyes were stinging as her shattered heart went out to him, leaving her feeling powerless to make anything better. "And now, with everything going on—" he continued, "I… I feel like it's on me to save us all." His shining hazel eyes were endless depths of misery and despair. "But I don't know how." A tear spilled out onto his cheek and his jaw trembled as he thought long and hard. "Ever since we were born, Dean's protected us. He's called the shots, lead the way, made the hard choices. He made it look easy, you know?" Self-loathing and helpless anger contorted Sam's face. "And now when he needed me the most, I let him get turned into a demon."

A spark lit Alex's eyes to an insistent glint. "No you didn't." Sam's ashamed gaze rose to look into hers. Alex wet her lips, because hadn't he thought of what she had? Her hopeful, teary eyes begged his. "We can cure him, Sam, right?"

Sam exhaled softly, shaking his head shallowly. "I dunno," he murmured grimly. "Most demons don't have this… this Mark of Cain thing, do they?" Alex's slight bravado faded. He was right. But she couldn't consider any alternative other than somehow getting their brother back. If she did, she would go insane from grief.

Sam walked off a couple steps, discontent and cagey. He kept his back to her, shaking his head and putting a hand onto his face. "I'm so tired," he confessed brokenly, his fire faded into a dull lethargy. "Of fighting. Of running. It never ends. And I can't do this anymore." There was a long, bitter pause. "But what other choice is there, right?" Approaching his side carefully, Alex put a hand onto the back of his arm, heartbroken for him—and knowing exactly how he felt. Threadbare. An inch from fraying apart completely. He looked at her sidelong, his face a mask of pain. "How are you being so strong?" he asked, visibly comparing himself to her and feeling guilty. "Aren't you scared?"

Confused because she thought it was obvious how absurdly immobilized by fear she felt, Alex's reply was instant as her eyebrows knit together. "Of course I'm scared." But as she thought back to what she'd shown to Sam in terms of her feelings lately, she realized she'd been protecting him from the very difficult truth. Maybe herself, too. "I… I think about it all the time." She wavered, taken by surprise at how hard it was to say out loud: "If I'm the next Mary Winchester." Her heart tightened and lips pressed together as her vision blurred with tears. "If… if I won't make it." Her hand cupped softly against her belly as she despaired at the thought of her child growing up like she had: without a mother. "If everything's doomed," she choked out. "If everyone dies in the end." It felt so futile sometimes. "If any of this even fucking matters when all's said and done."

Sam was gutted on her behalf, and for a moment he had a hard time finding words. "You don't deserve to be feeling this way during what should be the happiest time of your life," he finally murmured, in mourning for the life they lived.

There was only one quiet, forlorn response she could speak out loud. "I know." And as overjoyed the idea of oncoming motherhood made her in moments when she could forget everything else, afterward she was always left with very dark, real fears that her dreams would fizzle away into tatters. Wiping at her face as she tried to be tough, she was lost in a sea of shame and the very familiar feeling of being useless. Her eyes threatened to spill over. "I'm not gonna be able to help you bring Dean in, and that's freaking killing me right now," she admitted in a tight, watery voice.

Sam gave her one of his brave, sad smiles and tried for some despondent humor. "At least I've got Meg, right?" he asked, then sat heavily onto the hood's edge of the Impala, his head bowed because he had little else to offer at the moment. Another terrible, charged silence commenced, and Alex could only imagine what he was thinking about. For her, there was fear lurking on the edge of her mind that this version of Dean, demonic and stripped of humanity, would kill her twin brother. That she wouldn't be there to save either of them. It was too terrible to contemplate for long. But she knew her mind would haunt her with this thought and others too until further notice.

"You're not the only one shattered apart, Sam," Alex whispered hoarsely, emotion making her throat nearly close up. "I… I try not to think about it, I try to just take each day and keep my eyes on the ground right in front of my feet, you know?" She pressed her mouth inward, fighting a losing battle against a full out breakdown. "Because I don't know if I can take what's coming." The serene night felt mocking to the internal war being waged—the stakes screaming down at her, the losses she might have to endure, the impossible tasks she had to face. No matter what she wanted or didn't want, the sun would rise and set on time every day—and fate would come as it always did. Her voice broke completely as her face crumpled and she abruptly sobbed as hands flew to her face. All she could see in her mind's eye was the wounded look on Dean's face the last time she'd seen him in the bunker. The day that their family had shattered apart irrevocably. "I just want our brother back," she cried, right back where she'd been years ago at his graveside after the Hellhounds had come.

Not even a second later, strong arms closed around her and she blindly reciprocated, arms like vices as she wept and clung onto her brother. "I do too," Sam choked. He was crying too.

Later
The Bunker

Bobby tapped his fingers against the table surface impatiently, then checked his watch once again. They'd called about an hour ago, waking him up and telling him to be up because they had news about Dean. Nothing else had been shared, which struck the wizened hunter as ominous. He'd been around the block a time or two and could sniff out bad news coming a mile off. But he'd wait to get too worked up until he knew what was what. Which would be soon, because just then his ears picked up the faint crunch of gravel and the familiar purring whir of the Impala engine.

Momentarily, two of the Winchesters came in and plodded down the staircase: Sam and Alex. No Dean. Straight away Bobby's hopes took a downward turn. The kids both had dejected, pale faces and body language to match. Sam had a busted up nose and bruised eye—Alex had some random bloodstains on her shirt. Visibly exhausted, they didn't say hello, not even when Bobby stood up and rounded the table to greet them. They stood there silently, and Bobby got a real bad sinking feeling at the way they looked at him. "Well this can't be good," he muttered carefully, hoping he was wrong.

Sam spoke first. "We found Dean." His voice was ragged and weak and his shoulders slumped a fraction more. "Or… what's left of him, I guess."

That alarmed Bobby immediately. "…The hell you mean?" he asked in a soft murmur, the wind knocked out of his gut. Surely they didn't mean…

Sam delivered the facts blandly, like he was out of emotions. "According to Crowley, Dean was killed by an angel, and then brought back to life by this First Blade, Mark of Cain thing." Grim, Sam appeared in disbelief or shock. "Just… not as a human."

Bobby's narrowed eyes began to widen. "Wait," he breathed, face twisted up in confusion and denial. He looked at Alex, who was absolutely silent and traumatized—and avoiding direct eye contact. "You ain't sayin'…"

"He's a demon." Sam's leaden, hopeless statement made Bobby's entire world turn on its head. "He's not even him anymore." As if delivering the news had taken the last bit of energy out of him, Sam walked heavily to the table and collapsed down into a chair, putting his head in his hands.

What could Bobby even say to that? "Balls," he breathed, struck dumb by this terrible, unthinkable news. Alex visibly shared his distraught feelings and nodded just barely. Quickly, the hunter's mind sought solutions and he remembered about this so-called cure thing. That had to be what the twins were gonna do. "So we cure 'im, right?" he asked urgently, unsure why they'd look so dead inside if there were a solution present.

The brother and sister exchanged a brief, fatalistic glance. "Most demons don't have the Mark of Cain on them, Bobby," Sam pointed out dourly, and his eyes went listless as he stared into the bunker control room unseeingly. "We don't know what we're up against here."

In a bit of a daze, Bobby went and sat back at the table across from Sam, processing for a minute or two. Alex lingered despondently in place a few feet away as her brother continued to look into nothing. "Why'd'you two look like the game's already been called?" Bobby asked after a second, deciding this wasn't acceptable. "'Cause it ain't even near over yet, and I'm gonna need you to both stand yourselves up and fight." Two reluctant gazes came his way and Bobby drew himself a bit in his seat, recognizing that if there were ever a time he needed to bolster these kids, it was now. "Y'know, we ain't never known the way through," he reminded firmly. "All we've ever known was to do it together. It's been bad before kids. Don't forget how bad. It near plum always feels impossible." He became a little gentler, seeing how both of the siblings were trying to hide the tears building in their eyes. He had a solid hunch this wasn't the first time they'd cried that day either. "Bet you a hundred big ones this time's the same," he encouraged, trying to be both light but earnest at the same time.

Sam nodded woodenly. Kid looked exhausted. "Thanks Bobby." He pushed away from the table with a ragged exhale, his eyes traveling upward to where a few angel wards were chalked onto specific places along the walls. "I'm gonna get some rest and wake up early, scrub this place clean." Bobby squinted questioningly, and Sam explained: "Cas is on his way back."

That caused Bobby to slide his eyes over at Alex, who was biting at a thumbnail and far off somewhere in thought. "He comin' back for the reason I think?"

She heard him and her eyes focused and hand dropped to softly touch her pregnant belly. "I think I'm getting close, yeah." He could hear the guilt and conflict in her voice.

Tender and worried, Bobby nodded understanding. "When it rains, it sure does pour huh." He stood up and went over to her, looping an arm around her shoulders and rubbing her arm a couple times in a bearish side-hug. "Let's get you kids to bed."

But Alex didn't go to bed. She changed clothes and then quietly went to the library and began pulling out various volumes in desperate hopes of learning about the Mark of Cain. There was zero time to waste. Sleep be damned.

She'd only just opened the first thick volume when she sensed she had company. Peering down the long table, she saw Jamie hovering there, fully dressed with a fast asleep baby Rose strapped to her front in a baby carrier.

"…Hey," Alex said softly, surprised. Bobby told her she and Rose had moved into Dean's room from hers a few days ago. She hadn't expected to see either of them until the morning.

Jamie was distinctly hesitant and grim. "Hey." She came closer tentatively. "I overheard. What you told Bobby."

Well, fuck. Alex shut the book in front of her slowly, exhaling heavily. "…I wanted you to find out differently," she said wearily, understanding now why Jamie had that look on her face. And that's when she noticed her friend had a small duffel bag slung over her shoulder. Alex frowned, immediately suspicious. "…Why do you look like you're going somewhere?"

Haggard, Jamie pressed her mouth into a wan line. "I gotta get my spellbook. All my supplies—I put them into storage near Sioux Falls when I first got pregnant because I thought I was leaving hunting behind." She shifted her weight restlessly, a hand on her sleeping daughter. "I'm hoping it's all still there, 'cause it's looking like we're gonna need every last possible hand we can get."

Alex sat back in her seat thoughtfully. "If you really thought you were out, why didn't you destroy everything?"

A tiny smile appeared and softened the witch's tense features. "You got me there."

Growing apprehensive as she thought it through, Alex eyed the sleeping baby with rising concern. "…You're not taking Rose with you, are you?"

Jamie hesitated. "I actually wanted to ask if you'd watch her for me." She appeared nervous about asking. Maybe like she was imposing.

Softening, Alex contemplated for half a heartbeat before answering. "Of course." The last time she and James had been around a baby—that shifter baby—Alex had been a lot less cool about infants. Bumbling and freaked out might be the best descriptors. Now, she felt more confident from all the reading and preparation for her own son. It still made her a little nervous, but she was more relieved that her niece—Dean's baby—would be safe here rather than out there in the dangerous, rapidly shifting outside world. That's when Alex had a sudden realization and became intensely concerned. Her eyes snapped up to Jamie's. "You aren't… going after him, are you?"

Jamie's expression revealed nothing save for a small clench of the jaw. "That would be a pretty stupid move on my part, wouldn't it?"

The non-answer caused Alex pause. "I've done stupid stuff before in the name of love," she returned quietly. Because she could tell how Jamie felt by now, even if the witch had never directly said so.

The word 'love' caused her friend's expression to grow more vulnerable. Her outward shield faltered a bit. "I'm not going after him," she replied, becoming more guilty by the second. "Although I really feel like I should be." Her icy blue eyes dropped to Rose's fluffy blonde head, then studied Alex falteringly, and it was easy to see she was trying to pluck up some courage. "Look—Alex—you and I have been kind of missing each other for a year now, right? Feels like I haven't seen you in decades. And I'm guessing this is all a lot to process."

"What, you and Dean? Rose?" It definitely was. "I mean, yeah." But right now there were a lot bigger things on Alex's mind. Everything besides saving Dean and surviving past childbirth felt like small potatoes in comparison.

Jamie's eyes got this far off, reflective quality that wasn't without a fair measure of pain. "I just want you to know, he… he means a lot to me," she said sort of timidly, plainly feeling awkward. "You and Sam—you mean a lot to me too." The unexpected, heartfelt declaration softened Alex and touched her. James wasn't the type to wear her heart on her sleeve or make serious comments like that lightly. And after the fucking day Alex had endured, the things she'd seen—the brother she now knew was in need of rescue—it caused her to feel surprisingly deeply and turn her thoughts. For a second, she had to wonder what Jamie was feeling right now. The weight she was enduring. The unknowns that had to be plaguing this new mother. They all needed Dean back. Nothing would be right until then.

Alex rose to stand, her resolve renewed, especially when she looked at Rose's little sleeping face, smushed cheek-first against her mama's chest. This baby girl needed her dad. "We're gonna find a way to get him back, J," Alex promised, not hiding her turbulent, terrified emotions or the fear she felt. "I don't know how. But we will." Nodding dogged agreement, Jamie visibly tried to be optimistic. It was easy to see how terrified she was, too. Compelled to reach out, Alex did—and Jamie readily grasped her hand back. A silent promise that they were all in this twisted, fucked up, crazy shit together. And the rest, they'd figure out later.

About Twenty-Four Hours Later

Jamie hadn't lied about her intentions or about not going after Dean. She planned to get her things and return to the bunker immediately… until she'd gotten her hands on her stuff and been tempted to do a more complex locating spell than she'd done before. Then, when she'd seen that Dean was within a couple hours drive of where she was… her impulsive, desperate side had kicked in. She had to see for herself. And didn't know how to accept that the man she loved had become a demon. Foolishly, maybe she thought she could save him. He'd saved her, after all.

She found him in an old sprawling graveyard in rural Kansas, blasting 80s music at full volume as he drank beer after beer and amused himself by smashing headstones and defacing mausoleums. After watching him undetected for a few moments, she saw his pattern and prepared for a confrontation.

About fifteen minutes later, he casually strolled into the portion of the graveyard she'd known he'd choose next to vandalize, bopping his head to an old Van Halen song. Jamie revealed herself by stepping out from behind a massive gravestone. While her nerves were absolutely on edge, she gave nothing away with the expression on her face.

He stopped, pleasant surprise on his familiar features as eyes she knew but did not recognize appreciatively took her in, toe to head. "Well well well." A slow smiled dawned. He switched the music off on his handheld FM radio and set it down, then sauntered closer with a specific kind of interested glint in his eye. "What's a girl like you doin' in a place like this?"

Jamie smiled back with forced coolness, waiting for him to get just a bit closer. The moment he stepped into place, she answered him softly: "Putting you in a devil's trap." Immediately, he frowned even as her unassuming expression dropped into something fierce and angry. "Venit porro, ignis!"

The devil's trap, invisible to the eye prior, blazed to fiery life. The burst of flames died out to leave the trap burned into the dead grass and ground that Dean stood in the center of. Enraged, he took in the binding force surrounding him then immediately charged at her—and slammed up against the invisible hold just inches from her face. She suppressed a flinch. "Let me outta here, bitch!" he shouted, spittle flying. Then his peabrain registered what was happening and he gave a big show about acting annoyed. "Oh god," he lamented mockingly. "Of course. You think he's still in here, don't you?" He rolled his eyes. "First the siblings, now the girlfriend."

As someone who had been possessed, Jamie had to hope she could reach through to him like he'd done with her not so long ago. "Come back with me," she begged without pride, trying to see even a shadow of the man she knew in there. "We can fix this."

That earned her a dark look. "Can't fix what ain't broke, lady."

"Your daughter needs you," Jamie insisted. The composure she promised herself she'd keep was already nearly gone.

"Like I told the brother and sister," Dean said impatiently, almost sneering in distaste. "I ain't nobody's daddy."

The way it hurt to hear these words from his mouth was unspeakable. Taking a couple seconds, Jamie studied him with steely, fierce, angry eyes. "If you're not still in there, why are you in Kansas when you could be anywhere else in the world?"

There was immediate, over-exaggerated dismissal. "Pff. Coincidence." Full of animosity, the face glaring back at her was devoid of anything she recognized. "Trust me. The dude you're looking for is gone, sweetcheeks."

She wasn't totally sure either way. Jamie folded her arms, studying him hard. "Then who are you?"

He studied her like she studied him, with sharp eyes that missed nothing. "I mean, I'll still answer to Dean, if that's what you're asking. But the guy you knew before?" He cracked a self-satisfied smirk. "Well, all that's left of good ole Dean is the basics. Kill, party, live it up…" his eyes dropped low suggestively, lingering too long on places they shouldn't. "A roll in the hay here and there." Languidly, he fixed her with a smug smile. "Care to join me for that last one?" he suggested, enjoying the angry way her nostrils flared. "Old times' sake?" he goaded, amused by how he was the one stuck in place but he had the upper hand. "Sad story, huh," he said, hovering at the edge of the trap, so close that she could feel his breath. "Your first true love turned out to be a no good rotten demon," he whispered derisively, using information shared in confidence against her to drive the knife in. "Now your baby daddy… another no good rotten demon." Jamie bristled and tried not to show it. Dean was thoroughly enjoying the look on her face she tried to hide. "You really got a type," he pressed leeringly. "And it's cursed, just like you." He knew exactly how to ruffle her feathers, but Jamie stood her ground as Dean kept taunting her, playing on her very real private pain and trauma. And then he said something she hadn't expected. He went further than she thought he would. "I'd keep an eye on that little girl of yours if I were you, babe."

At the very clear threat against her daughter, Jamie saw red, and hackles springing to life, she lost her cool and attacked him thoughtlessly, swinging wildly and punching him in the face as hard as she could with a shout of fury. He got what he wanted out of the exchange: her shoe scraped against the devil's trap line and broke it. Seizing Jamie by the shoulders of her jacket, he hit her twice in the face without mercy—then screamed bloody murder when she grabbed his head and cracked her forehead against his, ripping some hair clean out of his head in the process from how tight her fingers clenched into his scalp. He threw her hard and far, like a sack. She hit the ground in a roll, already back on her feet as he rushed her—she dodged the right-hook he tried and slammed her knee into his ribs then shouted "retrorsum!" and sent him blasting backwards to collide with a solid headstone. It exploded into a chalky shower of rock with the force he hit it with, but he was already back up—and apparently enjoying himself.

"Sexy!" he proclaimed with a breathy grin at the sight of her bleeding face and heaving chest. "What else you got?" His eyes snapped black and he stalked toward her intimidatingly.

Jamie began to back up and in her panic, she dug into intuitive magic—which was not as easy to control as spoken spellwork, and took a lot more out of her physically. Her hands conducted invisibly and desperately, yanking and lobbing gravestones at him from left and right—it only slowed him down as each one broke against him or made him stagger sideways for a brief second. And suddenly he gained speed and was right up on her. He slammed her against a six foot statue of an angel with his body weight—and her head collided hard with the stone, dazing her and making a cry of pain come out. Dean breathed down on her, grinning at the defiance that remained in her fiery eyes. "Damn, it just me or is it hot in here?" he asked, a hand placed at her neck—all he needed to do was apply a pressure and he could suffocate her.

"Dean, please," Jamie said through gritted teeth, even though she didn't think he was in there at this point. She writhed hard against his immovable weight to distract him from the fact that she was grasping at the switchblade in her front pocket. A second or two more and it would be in her hand.

He chuckled throatily, running fingers sensually against her throat. "'Dean, please,'" he mimicked simperingly. With a flick of the wrist and a snarl on her face, Jamie snapped the switchblade open and shoved it forward and up hard—stabbing Dean right between the legs for all she was worth. He bellowed in pain and let go. "You crazy bitch!" he screamed, looking at her in furious disbelief as he staggered back—she'd already raised a shaking hand. Without a word, she shoved him kinetically backwards into the nearby open mausoleum door. The metal bar doors clanged shut behind him.

Out of breath, Jamie resisted collapsing and spat out the mouthful of blood as she watched Dean scramble to his feet then seize the bars on the door—then yelp when they sizzled his skin. He jumped backward, looking at his palms, the bars, then her. Realization dawned that she'd planned this entire thing out and had a backup way to trap him ready all along. Gone cold and threatening, he raised his chin and looked down his nose at her. "I can see why he liked you so much," he muttered distastefully. "You're fuckin' insane." He set her with a terrible look, like a wild animal. "This ain't the last you'll see of me, sweetheart. Bet on it."

Jamie matched his relentless glare with one of her own. "Oh I know it won't be," she returned, claiming the high ground and going a couple steps closer, showing him nothing of her true feelings. "Sit tight, 'cause we'll be back for you tomorrow." She lowered her chin, leaving him with a threat of her own: "I don't care if you look like my boyfriend. Come near me or my kid and I'll kill you where you stand."

There was a quiet, haunting little smile. "We'll see who kills who, beautiful."

Chilled, Jamie held his eye contact for a moment longer, then turned on her heel hard, leaving before he could see how devastated she was. Every step she took away from him, her demeanor crumbled more and more. By the time she got to the car she'd borrowed from Sam, she was in tears as the pain of her injuries and reality of the situation began to really settle in.

Bruising, beaten, bleeding, she sped back to the bunker, remembering the last thing Dean—her Dean—had said to her: "Won't be long babe. Wouldn't wanna keep my girls waiting." Her heart felt shattered apart, and hopelessness descended. She had to get him back. Had to.