A/N: Here is the next one, as promised, already working on the next chapter. Hope you enjoy :) Sorry for any typos/errors...
Chapter 7: To Fight A Demon
The devil's trap I paint is on the floor this time because the fallen ash from the charred room partially hides the black paint. Sam and Dean soon return to the room from laying out more salt lines. All that is left for us to do now is wait for the demon to show itself and hope our plan works.
"Do you think it knows we're here?" Sam asks to no one in particular.
"Yes," Dean and I say in unison.
We look at each other in shock.
"I mean, I hope it doesn't, but it's a possibility," I say. "Let's go back up."
With our traps set and our plan in motion, we head back upstairs to the first floor. The whole time we have been here nothing out of the ordinary has happened, which is a good sign. I am careful as I ascend the stairs, careful that I don't step through a rotten board. Sam and Dean follow behind me, also trying to avoid my earlier mistake. We get to the first floor and stop for a minute to rearrange our bags and check our shotguns. Everything could change in a split-second and I am not about to be caught off guard. A breeze cuts through the open building, carrying with it sounds of creaking boards and the rustling of trees outside. I notice Sam is looking around the floor nervously.
"Hey, are you okay?"
"Yeah. I've just had this bad feeling I can't shake."
"That makes two of us," I say under my breath, not knowing if Sam even heard me.
A few minutes later a loud, metallic banginterrupts the partial silence that has settled over the school. I feel like I jump ten feet at the sound and I am grateful I didn't accidentally fire my shotgun.
"What the hell?" Dean says.
"It came from upstairs," Sam says.
Upstairs. Crap, I think to myself.
I know I can't stop the brothers from investigating the noise, no one would be able to stop me either. The sound did not seem natural, though, and I am uneasy as we head back to the second floor.
Once we are back on the second floor, we split up to investigate the origin of the noise. Splitting up may not be the best idea, but our options are limited due to the size of the floor. I hold my shotgun up, ready to aim at anything that moves near me, in this situation I can't be too careful. Of course all a salt-filled round is going to do is piss off the demon, but at least it will buy me some time. At every corner, I aim my shotgun around first and then move around the corner. I find nothing and head back to the main part of the floor, where it splits into the adjacent hallways. With every step another board creaks out in protest and I fear I might fall through the floor again. Sam and Dean emerge from the hallway they checked, the long hallway.
"Nothing," Dean says. "Hey, let's see if we caught ourselves a demon."
I follow behind Sam and Dean back to where we laid out the devil's trap.
"Sam, you ready in case we caught it?" Dean asks.
"Yeah, if we caught it."
"Oh don't be such a downer, Sammy. Think positive," Dean says, playfully slapping his brother on the shoulder.
The slight breeze blows past me, making my hair stand on end. I start to get a sickening sense of déjà vu right before I realize why it is so familiar.
"Hey, Lara, did you see this the other day?" I hear Dean call from down the hallway.
I turn, my eyes widening when, suddenly, I am living out my nightmare. Sam has turned into one of the classrooms, Dean stands alone in the middle of the hallway. I hear a quiet snapping noise coming from where Dean is standing, I look up and see the loose board.
"Dean! Move!" I cry out, dropping my gun and running toward him.
I collide with Dean, pushing him further down the hallway. We both fall to the floor in a heap. The board on the ceiling crashes to the floor seconds later, right where Dean had been standing.
The fall to the floor hurts more than I expected and leaves me slightly disoriented. It takes me a few moments to realize I landed on top of Dean.
"Oh, my God, I'm so sorry!" I say, getting up off of Dean. "Are you okay?"
I offer him my hand to help him up.
"I'm a lot better than I would be if you hadn't done that," he says, taking my hand. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it," I say smiling, helping him up.
Dean looks at the large board lying on the floor, I walk over and pick up my gun from where I dropped it. The bad feeling I had about my nightmare intensifies, it definitely was not just a nightmare. I've heard stories about people getting visions, but only psychics, and as far as I know, I'm not a psychic.
"You two okay?" I hear Sam call from inside the classroom.
"Yeah, Sammy, we're fine," Dean says.
If my vision really is coming true, then we are far from "fine."
"We gotta get behind the devil's trap," I say.
"What?"
"Just- come on."
Dean and I move to the other side of the devil's trap with out backs to the small window, I still think we will have a hard time tricking the demon into the trap. Just as I am about to lower my shotgun, an invisible force yanks me forward off of my feet, back toward the other end of the hall. I land hard on the floor, face-first, my shotgun is jarred from my hand. I barely have time to take a breath before I am thrown up against the wall, pinned up by the invisible force and unable to move, almost exactly like in my vision.
"Dean! Sam! Run!" I yell, hoping they can trap the demon somehow.
The call dies out in my throat as the pressure increases sharply on my chest, pinning me tightly against the wall. I blink and a man has appeared in front of me, a man with solid black eyes.
Struggling is pointless, but I try anyway, I am able to slightly lift my head away from the wall so I can see the man better. He is tall, fair-skinned and his hair is as black as his eyes. Of course the man's eyes aren't actually black, they only appear that way because of the demon possessing him. The man can't be older than his early thirties, and he's dressed in a black business suit. Poor guy was probably just walking to work, not expecting anything and then a demon rammed itself down his throat. Demonic possession is a nasty business and most of the time those who are possessed can't be saved, but there are rare occasions where they can.
"You've caused me a lot of trouble," the demon says, his voice is deep. "I was just fine living in the shadows until you showed up and pointed a spotlight at me."
"You were killing people," I growl through the pain surging in my body.
The demon smiles crookedly and my head slams back against the wall, with more force holding me than before. Now I can't move at all, I am completely at the mercy of this demon.
"So? You hunters talk a big game, but you can't follow through, not with us. You can't do anything but send us back home. And what exactly did you think you were going to do when you came here? Come in guns blazing and hope for the best? Your egos get the better of you, all of you. That's why it's going to be so much fun to kill you, slowly, because you can't do a damn thing to stop it."
A sharp pain starts in my shoulder and slowly starts to slice down my chest like a hot blade. I scream out, unable to hold it back. I can feel blood starting to soak through my shirt where the demon is cutting into me.
"Hey, asshat!"
The booming voice is followed by a shotgun blast, which hits the demon. The demon vanishes and I crumple to the floor, the force holding me up dissipated at the same time as the demon.
I lay in a heap on the floor, my head spinning. The pain that has been shooting through my body subsides, but the pain in my shoulder remains. I let out a small, weak groan as I roll over onto my back, off of my shoulder.
"Lara!" I hear Dean yell, his voice wrought with concern.
I hear fast footsteps approaching and feel them through the floor. I open my eyes and see Dean standing beside me. He crouches down and I can tell he is looking at my shoulder.
"I'm fine," I say, at this point it is a routine response to danger.
"No you're not, your shoulder is bleeding pretty bad."
Despite the pain, I sit up, my head still spinning.
"I've had worse," I say.
"I'm sure you have, but that doesn't mean it isn't bad."
I look at his eyes and see genuine concern in them. I slowly remove my jacket, grimacing when I move my injured shoulder, and gently pull back my shirt sleeve.
"Damn," Dean says when he sees my wound.
Starting at the top of my shoulder, a jagged cut extends downward and stops a few inches below my collarbone. Blood streams out of the wound, staining my fingers and creating small lines that trace down my skin. As I look at the wound I hear more footsteps approaching, it's Sam.
"Hey, Sam, grab her something," Dean says.
Sam turns and walks to where our duffels sit on the floor, he goes through one of theirs. He pulls out a small cloth and walks it over to me. I take the cloth and press it against the wound with my uninjured arm, trying to stem the blood flow.
"Thanks," I say.
"Are you sure you're okay?" Sam asks, I can tell he is concerned too.
"Yeah, I'll be fine."
Dean helps me to my feet. I look around, there is no sign of the demon.
"He'll be back," I say. "He was pretty pissed off at me. Thanks, by the way."
"You already said that," Dean says.
"No, for shooting the bastard. Thanks, you saved my life."
"I guess we're even then," Dean replies with a smile.
After a few minutes of holding the cloth in place over the wound, the bleeding seems to go down, which thankfully means no stitches. There is nothing more we can do but wait and hope the demon doesn't get the jump on us again. I hate waiting, it makes me anxious and it makes me feel useless. I can tell Sam and Dean don't like it either, they are both fidgeting with their weapons.
"Hey, how did you know that board was going to fall?" Dean finally asks.
I think it over for a minute and then decide to answer honestly.
"Last night I had...a nightmare. Or at least I thought it was a nightmare until about ten minutes ago, when I started living it out."
"What do you mean, like a vision?" Sam asks.
"Kind of. It was exactly the same until I pushed Dean out of the way of the board. In the...vision, he got knocked out and then the demon attacked Sam and I. I'm not a psychic or anything, I don't know how-"
"It's fine," Sam says.
"What?"
"I know what you're trying to do. It's fine, we don't think you're a monster."
"Good, because I'm not."
"So...now that we got that out of the way-"
"We should go check downstairs," Sam says.
Dean and I both look at him with suspicion at his quick suggestion.
"What? We salted most of the exits and entrances, where else would he go? Besides, you said he wanted you."
When we get down to the devil's trap in the basement, the demon is not there.
"Great detective work, Sammy," Dean says sarcastically. "Nothing."
Sam shrugs, casting his eyes around the room. I hold my shotgun level with the wall, I will not make the mistake of lowering it again. Dean stands beside me, his shotgun also raised, his finger on the trigger. It is quiet, not even a breeze stirs, I don't like it.
"Look, Sam, the demon isn't down here, we're wasting-" Dean starts.
"Lara, duck!" Sam yells suddenly.
I don't question it, I flatten myself to the floor. At the same time, a large, metal rod breaks off of one of the twisted structures and flies over my head, embedding itself in the opposite wall. I look at Sam in shock.
"How-" I start.
Before I can finish my question, Sam and Dean are thrown back against the wall and I am pinned down in front of them, on the floor, by the demon. I try to get up, but the invisible force the demon uses feels like a ton of bricks on my back.
"Just couldn't get enough, could you?" the demon says mockingly to me, he swings a fist down at my face.
Blood runs down from my brow into my left eye.
"And, you two," he says, turning to where he threw Sam and Dean. "Daddy says 'hi' from the Pit."
"You son of a bitch!" Dean yells and lunges at the demon.
He doesn't get far, the demon pins him to the wall and then does the same to Sam. I am able to move slightly when his attention is not on me. With a massive amount of effort I reach into my back pocket and pull out the small bottle that's in it, I unscrew the lid.
"I've heard a lot about you two, honestly, I expected more."
He lands a punch into Dean's stomach, Dean grunts in pain. The demon then takes out a knife and holds it to Sam's throat.
"So, are you ready to go to the Pit?"
"No, but you are!"
I use all the strength I have to throw the small amount of holy water at the demon's face. The demon's skin sizzles and steams. He cries out in pain, grabbing at his face, stumbling back a step.
"You! I'm going to kill you first, I swear!" he says angrily, lunging forward.
The demon stops short, unable to take a step forward. With the force holding me gone, I brush the soot off the floor, revealing a black line of the devil's trap on the floor.
"Got you, asshole," I say, exhausted.
Sam and Dean walk up to stand beside me and, together, all three of us look at the demon within the trap. Sam has a small cut on his throat, the back of Dean's head is bleeding, and blood is clouding the vision in my left eye. I know we all feel a sense of accomplishment, of triumph, but we are all too exhausted to show it. All of the years, all of the lives, and it will end now, the killings will stop.
"Alright, Sam," Dean says. "Show time."
Sam looks at the demon and I see pure rage flash in his green eyes for a moment before he starts.
"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica postestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii..." Sam pauses.
The demon starts to trash and make guttural noises.
"...omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica. Ergo, draco maledicte. Ecclesiam tuam securi tibi facias libertate servire, te rogamus, audi nos."
As soon as Sam says the last two words, the demon's head snaps up, and black smoke pours out of the man's mouth with immense force. The smoke swirls out of the man's body and dissolves into the floor. The man collapses to the floor, motionless. Dean walks over and places two fingers on the man's carotid artery, a few seconds later he shakes his head.
"Demon rode him hard, he's dead."
I shake my head, "At least it can't hurt any more people."
We grab up our bags and head out of the school, once and for all. As the giant doors swing closed behind me, a sigh in relief. It's finally over.
A/N: Hope you liked it :) it's a little shorter than usual but I didn't want to drag it out. As always, comments are appreciated, I like to hear feedback so I can improve as I go. Thanks for reading.