The world is tinged with need and everything aches with hunger. I feel free and light despite this emptiness though, in fact I begin to float. I tentatively will myself to move, and delight surges through me and I fly around the prison, suddenly under my own control. I am falsely free. While it feels like home here, it is still a prison. I need a key. I fly at the near passed out angel in front of me and slam down into the body as I had seen done so many times, as had been done to me so many times.

It feels so natural. Like I know exactly what to do. I manifest in the angel's mind and we fight for control of the body. A fight I know I will lose. But I need to find out something. I wrap myself around the angel as best I can and squeeze.

"Cas. Let me take control. I'll get us out and-"

"No. I-"

"You've made worse deals. You've made ones with Lucifer!"

"And I learned from those mistakes."

"Fine. Give me control or I will-"

"Devour me? You think that would be worse than spending eternity in the Empty?"

"No. I'll figure out a way to push you into your own mind and make you happy so you get taken. I'll leave you to rot in the Empty knowing you aren't here to protect your friends from Crowley Or me."

"Chew Toy. Get out of there. I will destroy that body."

"See? As long as I'm in here, we're both in danger."

"I have no problem with losing this body. The soul that was here with me is dead."

"Did you die for the first time during that fight?"

"Yes."

"Then that soul is currently being devoured. I doubt it's not damaged having been sitting next to an angle for decades. I can get us out of here so that doesn't happen to Sam and Dean and Jack."

"You don't even know what type of demon you are, can you even teleport?"

"No clue. Let's find out."

"Chew Toy."

"Cas. Worst that happens is I lie and your friends die, which is going to happen whether or not you help me. So let's cause some trouble before we go out."

"That's what you want to do? Cause trouble before he kills us both?"

"You. He'll kill you. I don't care if I die. He won't kill me as long as I see death as a reprieve. And he won't let me escape somewhere where I can experience any pleasure without him there to leech it from me, even if it's to the Empty. Let me put it another way." I pull at the soul I've wrapped myself around. "Crowley said the hunger is less intense when you inhabit a body. And I'm hungry."

"And in here you only have me to eat, out there you have more."

I scream in rage and pull at the soul. It's pure and whole, God's work putting an angel back together is a bit better than a spell's after all. He still seems pristine. Time to find out if I was just a bit more dangerous than Crowley.

I tear at the pure undamaged soul, and it rips, slightly. It rips but fights back. I'm not bound by Bobby and Dragoness's deal. I'm not bound by contracts. I'm not even bound by lack of power. I have hundreds of years worth of experience on how to do this, and I'm a very hungry demon. Castiel screams out and Crowley curses.

"Tell him Castiel. Tell him I will steal his meal if he doesn't let us out right now. I will take the pleasure of killing you from him."

"No! I am not a messenger boy!" Castiel yells out loud in his pain.

"What is she saying angel boy?"

"No. I… won't. I'd rather die." Crowley snarls and snaps. The angel and I vanish, once again, and appear in Crowley's clawed hand. "No!"

"No what angel boy?"

"She wants to be out here."

"Of course she does. Is that it?" Castiel is silent and with another snap he is wracked through with pain again. It feels amazing and I bask in it. It hurts so badly and feels so good. "What. Else?" The pain stops and Castiel pants, staring defiantly. I take the moment to rip out part of his grace, and a small part of his soul. He screams and Crowley flinches, knowing he had not done that. "What is she doing to you?" He snaps and tries to pull me out, but it doesn't work anymore. I'm not a soul he owns. I'm a demon. He can destroy me with a thought, but he can no longer control what I do. I need to get away from here, and fast. I need a hostage to do so though. Leaving the body and floating around as smoke Crowley could just swallow me again… unless I'm fast. He's big, near 30 million big. That extra weight translates to precious seconds when leaving a body or changing form. Still, I want a hostage. I-

"Crowley. She's going to escape and take me w-" I rage and tear at the soul next to me, giving away my plans. I'm nowhere near as effective as Crowley, but the rage clears my head. I can't take Cas with me, for a myriad of reasons, one being that Crowley will have to take precious moments to contain him again.

Before Cas can mention my thoughts I burst out into the fresh air. I rejoice, for I am most definitely red, and oh do I have ideas for that little happenstance. I'm a bit darker than Crowley, more old dried thick blood than a pretty ruby, but I'm still red.

"Don't you dare Chew Toy."

I ignore him. I ignore the empty bodies with faces he can have tracked. I ignore the fleeting attempt of an angel to hold me with him. I ignore the faint pull of Hell from the circle. I ignore everything but the fresh air and my newfound ability… To fly.

I rush up and over the roof and out of sight. Long gone and out of reach before Crowley can think. Or so I want it to look like. In reality I fly down and rush through the nearby trees a bit before coming back around the outside of the house to hover beneath the overhang of the roof. I want to know Crowley's next plans. He would expect me to leave, every sane being would. But I'm not. I'm smart and very stupid at the same time. I can't take over a body here and teleport out, any demon I kill would be noticed in their absence or death. Crowley might assume his plans are compromised and this would be for naught. I can't just fly out of here, I know there are acres of cameras, but I don't know their exact locations. My memory isn't that good. So I need to know what his plans are. I know I'm going to lose this battle, but I'd like it to last for a bit. The best way to do that is stay under the radar. So I hope the false bit of imagery I left in the cameras already makes it seem like I'm floundering when I do leave, and then I float and wait.

And listen happily to the curses above.

"You bumbling excuse for an angel!"

"You expected me to hold onto her?!"

"No, I expected you to be able to tell me her plans!"

"I told you she was trying to escape Crowley. Why did you even remove her from the prison if this was a possibility?"

"Because she was killing you. I've saved your life, been toyed with by you. Cas, we've been married for centuries. It's my right to file for divorce, not hers! ...And it's high time I handed you the papers." There is a crunch, then another, then nothing except the sound of an exhale. Cas's body is dead. There are some things even an angel can't heal; like being torn apart. I can't see it, but I know that's what happened by the satisfied tired sigh from Crowley and the silence from the dour angel. The only sound that fills the air is chewing.

I wait for the inevitable, interested to be on the other side for once. I don't have long to wait at all.

"Of course I'm going after her Cas. I can't pay attention to you and her at once though, so I had to cut our orgy short. … Of course it was an orgy, you were...Yes well it's a bit less physical now. ….. Yes, you'll meet my scaley friend eventually, but for now you're coming along for the ride. Partners on a case again. In fact, let's get the team back together…. but first." There is a slight pause and a whooshing sound, I can see a bit of red smoke in the sky briefly and I know Crowley is once again back in his human form. He no longer has a reason to stay in the demon one. Dead bodies can be digested in a pocket dimension, their use for torture is spent they are only disatisfying meat.

There is silence for a brief moment and then Crowley speaks, and what he says does not bode well.

"Dean." Shit. Of course he'd call them. Well, let's see how much smarter they are than they were portrayed in the show. I don't have enough experience with them to say how smart they are. The show wouldn't have been interesting if they were perfect hunters, but they gained a reputation somehow and I doubt it was because they were Chuck's favorite characters. That was a metaphor after all. I continue listening closely, trying to glean as much as I can from one side of the conversation.

"Yes. Hello. No. I'm not reneging on our deal but we have bigger problems... Yes, bigger than me. Yes Cas is here. He says to… fine." There is some fumbling, false I believe, and then Cas's voice comes out of Crowley's mouth. I have a feeling it isn't Cas speaking though.

"Dean. Crowley's right. We have bigger problems than him at the moment. Rebecca's escaped and… his pet soul. Yes, the one you met. No. She is far more dangerous now that she has been turned into a demon. No-" There is more false fumbling as Crowley 'takes the phone from Cas'.

"Not intentionally Dean, I broke my toy then lost it. Yes, I am a forlorn child who needs a cry and a hug from mummy. In the meantime I need you to look for her before she Eats too many people." Crowley's voice echoes on the balcony again and I can feel the smugness from here. "She doesn't have my particular potency problem Squirrel, she can kill anyone she likes. No she's not more powerful than me you idiot, she's just seen me do it 30 Million times and didn't learn a thing. ...Yes I'm being sarcastic….. Put Moose on… hello Moose. I have one thing to say. She killed Robert. Ate him like a chocolate filled cherry. Bring her back alive and I will make sure she suffers. Don't, and I will do what she did to Robert, to Cas. Keep in touch." Shit. Shit shit shit.

Silence reigns for a moment as Crowley and I take in the possibilities and outcomes of what he just did. Shit. Still, I can't leave yet, I don't have the information I really need.

"No Cas. Montreal. I have a package to get, but first I want to check the cameras." That's what I needed to know. I quickly look around for a bird, only now remembering that I can possess animals. I find a dove quickly enough, but that won't do. I keep looking, carefully avoiding the cameras I know of around the house. The bird I want would be here soon enough, I can't afford to waste time but I can afford to be noticed less and-

There is a ringing on the roof and I'm brought out of my thoughts as Crowley answers his phone.

"Yes Moose? … No, I don't know her symbol yet. She needs a name for a symbol and- Of course she has a new name, she's a demon. Well usually the torturer gives the name to the new demon, but she's Not Exactly Here To Receive It and have her symbol appear in the books! So I guess she might choose her own, fortunately I have an idea of what it might be. Try the main character in her books, which you should read if you want to catch her. You like doing research right? There are copies at Sara's base. Well it's not your base anymore is it? I'll have Rowena try to figure out what the symbol might be. Yes the symbol will appear in the books when she chooses a name. Do you know how you find a demon's symbol in a book that is over 400,000 pages? By referencing their name! Now Get To Work!"

I laugh silently, I'm glad I stayed. I may very well have chosen that name, but I have another. Shahaerisaad. My butchered version of the story teller. And I have some stories to write. For now though, I wait.

Soon enough the bodies on the balcony attract what I want, a turkey vulture. Something whose flight pattern of meandering but focused lines won't arouse suspicion. It circles the house, I wait until it gets lower and toward my side. I rush up quickly and take over the bird, looking down briefly to see if Crowley is still there. He is not. The house looks beautiful from up here, the balcony painted red. I have no time to admire the abstract art though.

I circle a few times then fly off to the nearest town as quickly as I dare. I stop to peck at a dead coyote I spy, try to act like the bird I am inhabiting. It takes a bit longer but I am fairly confident Crowley does not know which direction I went in.

I arrive at the town of Casitas Springs, not thinking it a good idea to go to the closest town of Ojai. I head to a trailer park, tiny homes with lots of entry spots. The trailer park is large, a camping one I believe, which means nobody is really paying attention to the residents here, hopefully. There are not too many trailers right now, five at the most. I sneak into the first one, not really caring who I get. I ditch the bird midair and flow in through an open window to the smell of smoke, tobacco smoke. Cigarette tobacco smoke. Still don't like that smell, and now I feel it mixing with my smoke. Ugh.

I circle up behind a middle aged woman, blonde hair and skinny, far skinnier and better looking than I had ever been. She looks sad though. As she cooks an egg in a floral apron with a cigarette on her lips I barrel through them as she pauses to take a breath. I fill her every atom and then take a moment to examine her.

No wonder she is sad. She is newly divorced. She lost everything because of her addiction, including the kids. She kept the trailer but that was it. She hasn't had a job for thirty years, having been a stay at home mom up until two years ago when an old friend visited, trying to sell his wares. Make some money. He had sold her some opioids, saying it would help her back pain from a car crash five years ago. That had spiraled quickly.

However it means no one will come looking for her. I look around at the futuristic trailer, the glowing magnets in the stove, the neon lighting, the hovering security system, the very illegal fast action heating pad with injectors. The very flammable fast action heating pad with injectors. I snap and it turns on to the maximum setting. Oh, that is satisfying, to snap and do things.

I put a blanket on it and some of her clothes. There will be a fire within fifteen minutes. I look around quickly to make sure nothing is amiss, betraying my interference, and when I find none, grab her wallet and anything she has for trade. She quickly betrays the location of her stocks password, which she also quickly tells me is worthless. The heating pad was expensive. Trying to kick the habit with smaller and smaller doses intertwined with heat I suppose. She does however have cigarettes, and a few credits. I look up the nearest building center on her phone, the equivalent of a Home Depot or such. I'm there with a thought. I stagger out of the teleport, but smile. It is as awesome as I always imagined, but I have no time to ponder it.

I look around quickly for the materials I need and realize as soon as I acquire them that I really don't need money. With my stolen contraband in hand I snap myself away to Montreal. To Crowley's personal stash. To where I think he's kept my bones.

I arrive outside a door I know well. It's where he moved his more important items after the ordeal with the Men of Letters hundreds of years ago. He had checked on it once or twice, just to make sure. The building is old, unassuming, and surrounded by fencing that is falling apart. Everything about the building looks abandoned except for the sign saying 'toxic chemical storage, keep out.' The door in front of me is Covered in sigils. Glowing with energy, it is foreboding and impassible. The rest of the building has sigils too, preventing entry from windows and doors. I'm not even going to try to enter near any of those.

I look to the top of the building, cement and barren and flat. Perfect. I have wanted to try this for...since I was alive in my own body. I grin, I'm excited. I bamf to the top and start mixing the iron oxide and aluminum oxide in the flower pot, double checking the ratio on the phone before destroying it. Looking up info like that will get you tracked these days. I feel a slight protest from the woman...Janice, and chuckle. My little prisoner, I have plans for you. I just don't have time yet, and I may need info on this new age that I am not accustomed to. With the mixture ready, I place it over the center of the room and stand back. With a snap of my thumbs the strip of magnesium lights up in sparks, my will replacing a match.

I watch as the fuse ignites the mixture in the pot. Soon enough the flower pot starts to glow as the thermite mixture melts it, and the ceiling below it as well. It takes a good three or four minutes, but I grabbed a lot of ingredients and a big ass flower pot. And thermite is fucking awesome.

I drop through the glowing hole, and quickly jump out of the mess of glowing heat and shed my shoes. Thermite doesn't stop until it uses up its fuel after all, the shoes are toast. I quickly look around the room. So many shiny things to look at, power to have and play with. I suppose I would be tempted any other time, but I need my bones more than anything. Crowley would come here to get them, he had done extensive warding. He didn't want to break it just to get my bones. Now I just have to figure what he would keep them in.

I look around. This was a last precaution type of thing. Near an afterthought. After all, him turning me into a demon? Unlikely. Becoming powerful enough to warrant destroying or threatening? Not a chance. Of course, neither of us counted on what me just being near him would do to my soul. So, I am worthless, but still a precaution. My bones are in a corner in a locked box with no warding, or a bag labeled tools or something. He doesn't want my bones in something pricey, if someone did actually get in here he wants me overlooked. Like that staff. Never in plain sight. Misdirection.

I look around for something he would think I would discount. Specifically me. The room is filled with boxes and bags and chests and books. Books. I wouldn't look for any item in something that isn't a container. I quickly look at the biggest pile of books and shift one slightly. It moves. I pull it out and look behind it. Nothing. I frown and replace it. Not there. Hurry hurry. Think think. Wait. I have help. I need to think like not me, so...

"Janice, where would you hide a body here?"

"Uh, where you put a body. A coffin." I blink. That isn't hiding a body. It's the last thing I would think of, overthinking everything as I do. There are however three coffins, one is a sarcophagus. I open that one first. The multiple layers provide an obstacle. It's expensive sure, but also really hard to move and sell in the black market. Finally I get all the layers open and lean over to look. Inside is a mummy. I thank my studies and obsession with ancient Egypt when I was younger and look closer at the bandages and wrapping. Thick and wide, old and thin. Wrapped right behind the top layer is an amulet of a scarab. I peel back the bandages around the eye and poke my finger in the socket and up. Empty. I feel down, yup; broken nasal cavity. It had its brain removed. I feel the top of the head where a few hairs remain, waxy from scented waxes to cover the smell. This is a real mummy, and not a mummy of high standing, or it was done in quite the rush if it still had wax on its head. Either way it isn't me wrapped up to look like one.

I replace everything as best I can and quickly look at the second coffin. Basic painted wood from the 21st century, I look at the third. Old vampire horror movie style one. That's where I'd want to be placed, so I look in the other.

I'm greeted with bones, ones I have no idea if they are mine. I turn over the skull and look at the back of the head. Mine has a slight flat spot. I like to think it's from where some kids bashed my head into a wall when I was a kid. Assholes trying to avoid being bullied themselves, pick on the weird kid or be bullied yourself. I wonder if they have any descendants? I shake my head. Focus. Food later.

I look at the back of the skull, it indeed has a flat spot. I look at the neck, slightly curved from muscle knots pulling it out of alignment. It's me. I quickly stuff it into the thick bag I brought the thermite ingredients in. I won't even try snapping it away, I doubt the warding will let me. I look at the books on the way out and decide that I could stand to do my own misdirection. I open the other coffin and put the skeleton from there into the one I removed my body from. I'd go grab another body but I'm not sure I have time. I look over the books after I close up both coffins. Where is it? There! The little brown book Crowley had gone through so much trouble to retrieve. His journal. I don't really care about it, but if he thought I came here to grab that? I quickly take it and two other random books and throw them into the bag.

I scramble up out the hole, after happily looking at the crater in the floor that is now 5 feet deep and still glowing. I fucking love thermite. Once on the roof I snap the bag and myself away to a graveyard.

Unearthing the oldest grave takes seconds. Desecrating the body even less. I barely register the name on the headstone except to make sure it's female, about the age I was when I died, and at least 300 years old. Well, thanks for the help, whoever you were! I bamf back to the building and pause, listening from the roof. No one. I have a feeling Crowley is delegating research into my new name and symbol as well as keeping me human. This whole ordeal has taken me about an hour, I can't imagine I have more than a few moments before he arrives. I jump back in and once again open both coffins. I move the skeleton back to its rightful home and place my new 'friend' into my body's home for the last few centuries. I had no idea if that other body was male or if Crowley could tell. I didn't want to take the chance. I'm only hoping the skeleton I took wasn't from a soul born into the wrong body. A Dennis who became a Dorothy.

I'm putting the finishing touches, aka shoving the nails back into the old vampire coffin when I hear it. Footsteps.

I scramble out the top as fast as I can and lay flat on the roof. As flat as I fucking can, and start crawling away.

"-her bones Ostrich. Insurance for her compliance. Of course she knows I won't burn them...willingly. If she leaves me no choice I will light parts of it aflame until-... I Suppose if there is absolutely no other way… Castiel you poofed up excuse for a nightlight! I will destroy her soul myself before I resort to burning her bones, but if I have to I will! Then I'll drag her back from the Empty and destroy her myself! ...I'll figure it out later." The door opens below me and in that instance of distraction from physical exertion I teleport away. I'm there just long enough to hear curses from Crowley.

I'm hoping against hope my misdirection gives me enough time to enact my own plan. I told him to grind his bones to dust and scatter them. He said they could be reconstituted as long as they exist. Well, if I turn them into something else, they won't exist.

Back in the graveyard I grab the bag of me and teleport away. I need heavy. Heavy and flat. And I don't feel like dealing with new age machinery. Rocks it is. Good old rocks. I love rocks.

Arizona. Rocky outcrops and hills. Joshua Tree park. It's night here and cold. The desert night sky is as fantastic as I remember. I want to take time to look at it with my own eyes, my own will, for as long as I want, but I can't. Later. I have work to do. First things first I check out the two books I grabbed. I look at the blue one, spells. Don't have enough time to learn them. I set it aside and look at the other. It's filled with symbols on brittle paper. I flip through it quickly. Is it really? Could I be that fucking lucky for once in my life? Fuck me it is. I quickly draw the symbol I recognize from Rowena's dress, the one that hides you from hellhounds, in the dirt. Then I draw it again. And again. And again. I draw it until I have it memorized and then I carve it into Janice's skin. I stand satisfied that I've committed it to memory then I set about finding the biggest boulder I can that I can move, and the flattest rock.

I find one nearby luckily, it's a brown red flat rock and I empty the bag on it then set the bones out. With that done I turn and stare at the 200 pound boulder I am about to try lifting. It's sandstone, therefore quite big, not dense at all. I squat then wrap my arms around it, pause to take in its latent warmth from the sun for a moment, and lift.

I stand. Easily. Man, magic is weird. I hold the boulder in front of me and walk with it as if it's nothing more than a heavy barbell. I hold it over the bones, and drop it. I pick it up. I drop it again. I do this for a good fifteen minutes until I have a fine powder. I quickly snap it into the bag with a thought, not wanting to lose too much to a light breeze, although the air is perfectly still tonight. This is gonna suck, fortunately demon physiology pretty much meant that whatever I ate would just be completely absorbed. However… it meant I needed to be in Hell. Just to be real fucking sure. So...sorry Janice. But I can't take you with me alive, it's way past dinner time anyway.

I feel giddy as I squeeze the small bit of light into the red smoke that is me. I hold it there, sinking into it as far as I can without a contract, and then pull. I pull in every direction at once. I had seen Crowley do this millions of times, it's harder than it looks. Taking just a bit of Castiel was easy, this is breaking something down entirely. It takes a lot of effort to do something that shouldn't be possible, but I have a bit of Crowley's power, knowledge, curse… Stuff. Whatever. He needed contracts to do this to pure souls until he got powerful enough. Before Robert put that rule into place with Dragoness. I wonder how it is worded? Did she intend to take that ability away from him completely? It seemed that is what happened, I had thought he would grow powerful enough to destroy a pure soul by himself, he should have passed that ages ago. So it seems Robert had a small success in subverting Crowley yet again. No pure souls for him.

Now me… I have no such law holding me. I could rip into Robert easily, as damaged as he was. Castiel, Grace isn't a soul. And now that I think on it, I really have no idea what I was eating of his back there. I think I got a bite or two of his soul, but I'm not sure.

I feel the white ball that is Janice in the red smoke that makes up my form now. Crowley had claimed to the boys I could destroy pure souls, a threat worthy of concern, now to find out if he was right. Time to find out what power level I'm starting at here. I'm hoping for over 9000.

I pull again, the silent screams egging me on as their vibrations ring off the confinement of this stolen body. I pull and feel the energy begin to break apart in me. It feels like stars, tiny parts of a supernova blasting out to make new planets in the smoky ether. I will gladly take it and make new worlds with it. I pull harder and with a snap I'm covered in a rain of sunlight. Janice is gone, her memories moving through my smoke. White specks of a person flying through my red Milky Way. I look up and sigh, happy to mirror the sky above; I am content. That feeling lasts for all of a half second before the hunger creeps up again. So much for that. I guess I did inherit the curse.

I turn to grab the books and see they are gone. Time to go. As long as Crowley knew what a thing looked like, knew the object intimately, he could call on it as long as it wasn't behind warding. I'm pretty sure he couldn't trace those back to me. Pretty sure. I'm not staying to find out. I pick up the bag and focus on red stone and screams, and take my first trip back to Hell as something that would feel truly at home there. Probably.

(Is it weird yet? It's gonna get weird now.)