Chapter 4

12:45 am. October 13, 2012. Sacramento, California

Tricia glanced at Sam as she pulled in next to the kerb of the empty, dark street. The neighbourhood was quiet and dark, a no-man's land in between light commercial and residential, neither one nor the other. A couple of apartment blocks were further down the road, a block away the tract houses began and spread west. But here, there were two used car lots, several garages, a small wrecker's yard and a long stretch of vacant storefronts, all vacant right now.

Both Winchesters had been sleeping most of the way down, and they stirred together now as she turned off the engine and killed the lights.

"We here?" Sam looked over at her. She nodded at the used car lot across the street.

Sam yawned and looked over his shoulder. "C'mon, man. We're here."

Dean opened his eyes and looked around, stretching as much as the cramped rear seat allowed.

"Straight back, Trish." Sam opened the car door and eased himself out. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yep, you two drive safe."

Dean climbed out past the front seat, and stretched as Tricia made a u-turn and drove quietly away.

The lot had a few of the cars they were after; they would be able to pick and choose. The piece of crap compacts and subs they'd been using were not suitable for the jobs the teams would be doing over the next few weeks. They needed speed and reliability, and so far as he was concerned, that meant only one kind of car.

An eight foot chainlink fence ran around the perimeter, the entrance and exit ramps blocked by steel frame gates of the same height, padlocked with a half inch chain. Sam pulled a bolt cutter from the black duffle bag over his shoulder and cut the chain and Dean caught it, lowering it to the ground as he swung the left side gate open and Sam opened the right side. Without needing to discuss it, Dean headed for the far left row while Sam walked across to the far right. The place had no security except a dummy camera on the front of the sales building. None of the surrounding businesses had cameras either, and none were close enough to get clear shots even if they had. Dean found what he wanted in the second row.

Two minutes later, two of the cars parked there were running, headlights on as they drove out quietly. The '69 SS Camaro was a dark blue, the '83 Cutlass a deep gold. The engines rumbled softly as they tooled gently down the street, barely waking the neighbourhood dogs.

Two miles away in a busier part of the city, they stopped in the parking lot of a fast-food chain restaurant, choosing the darkened slots furthest from the buildings. Sam began to unscrew licence plates, while Dean wandered across the car park to get them dinner.

In twenty minutes, the two cars were on the interstate, their respective drivers eating, as they drove east to Carson City.

6:35 am, October 14, 2012. Scotts Mills, Willamette Valley, Oregon

The forest was dimly lit, the sky above overcast and little of the dull glare filtering through the canopy that was still mostly brittle leaves. On the ground, the deep humus cushioned footfalls and allowed those walking to move in near silence. Twelve feet above the ground, tucked comfortably into the wide fork between several branches, Twist and Adam watched Adina and Idan pass below them, the nephilim communicating with hand signals, watching both sides of the trail.

Adam waited for Twist, lifting the barrel of his marker slowly and taking aim. The hunter's nod was clear in his peripheral vision and he squeezed the trigger, the pellet exploding against Adina's back in a burst of orange paint. Idan dropped and rolled sideways, off the trail and out of sight, Twist's pellet flying past him. Lifting his marker and aiming more by instinct than by what he could see, he sent a second pellet into the undergrowth then heard the distinctive sound of an incoming round. Twist ducked behind his branch but Adam knew he was too slow, the impact on his shoulder almost knocking him from the branch as lime green paint dripped down his sleeve.

Twist returned fire and Idan retreated to another group of trees, the barrel of his marker raised visible for a second then gone as he waited for them to move.

Twist looked down the path, then turned to Adam, his voice low. "That just a wound?"

Adam nodded. Left shoulder and he'd still be able to fire and hopefully stay out of sight, though if the sun came out, his shoulder would be brighter than a flashlight.

"Give me covering fire until I can work my around to him. He's in the trees, no more'n twenty feet along the trail."

Adam shifted upward and stretched out along a higher branch. He began to fire pods towards the trees and screening undergrowth ten feet further down the path. He was rewarded by a rustling in them and kept firing. Beneath, Twist's drop to the ground was hardly audible. The hunter was invisible, even in the thick greenery, as he made his way in a large semi-circle around to the nephilim. After a moment, Adam stopped looking for him, focusing his attention on keeping Idan pinned down where he was.

When Twist rose up through the bracken a few minutes later, Adam saw Idan look at the older hunter in resignation. The nephilim had probably known that the hunter was somewhere nearby, but hadn't felt he had a good enough position to take on both of them. Twist's pod exploded in violent red over Idan's chest and the nephilim dropped cross-legged to the forest floor.

Adam slipped the marker over his shoulder by the strap and climbed down the tree, careful to avoid stepping on Adina. She gave him a rueful shrug, her grin flashing through the spattered pink paint on her face and he smiled back.

Twist was lecturing Idan. "If you're think you're being flanked, you probably are. A moving target is harder to hit, especially amidst trees. Keep moving until you're clear."

The nephilim nodded in understanding. "Do we stay here until everyone's hit?"

"Yep," Twist said, turning to look over his shoulder. "C'mon Adam, we got three more to clean up before we can have breakfast, and I'm starving."

8:30 am.

"We really need to start with the oldest and work our way toward the present."

Ellie looked at the boxes neatly stacked around the exterior walls. The basement consisted of three large, open spaces, separated by half-wall-and-windows interior walls, and two smaller areas, one under the kitchen, acting as a root cellar and freezer storage, the other at the opposite side of the house, holding the boiler, oil storage tanks and laundry. The open areas had been lined, carpeted and were now filled with shelving, long tables for reading in the centre, and along the half walls for the computers, scanners and printers. Since setting up, she'd been able to scan in almost a thousand documents, manipulating the images to increase legibility and enable easier translations. Of course, her rough calculations of Penemue's research they had here, along with her works, was closer to half a million documents, but with help, she hoped they could move faster.

Bezaliel nodded. "And get Sagi and Talya in here to help with these. They both have a good knowledge of the ancient languages."

"Are they training today?" she asked, trying to keep an edge from her voice.

Her workforce was constantly fluctuating. When Dean and Sam got back, she would lose more of the nephilim to sorties against the Levis. There wasn't any point feeling sorry for herself; she'd organised the idea of the smaller units of offence.

"They finished with the dawn paint patrol." The Watcher's expression was amusement. "They're supposed to be studying anyway, this will be of more value, I think." He rose to his feet. "I'll get them."

Ellie watched him leave, thinking that the constant exposure to the colloquialisms of the hunters was really corrupting the fallen angels. A memory of Pen's vocal disapproval of local patois flashed through her mind and her smile faded.

She started the process of clearing the tables of the documents that had already been scanned and translated, making room for the extra researchers. If nothing else came of this exercise, they would have a lot of information in the databases and that would be a help.

"You shouldn't be doing that heavy lifting, Ellie."

The room's temperature dropped and she turned around to see Bobby standing in the doorway, a faint sparkle of frost edging the jambs.

"Hey, Bobby, come to lend a hand?"

"If I can. Reading in this state is no picnic." He drifted into the room. "Seriously, Ellie leave that for nephilim. Don't need to worry Dean anymore than he already is."

She grinned. "I won't tell him if you don't."

"Huh. But I will, if I think you're overdoing it."

"Is that why he left the flask here, Bobby? So you can keep an eye on me for him?" She'd wondered about Dean's motives when she'd questioned the flask's presence in the living room. He'd hand-waved some excuse by her.

"No." The spirit turned away, apparently interested in the long table of humming computers. "No, I told him I was sick of travelling around and wanted to stay in one place for a while."

"God, you're nearly as bad a liar as he is."

"Don't get snippy with me." He looked down at a pile of manuscripts. "I just think you could take it easy for the next couple of months and save us all a load of worry."

"I'd love to. But the thought of Lucifer regaining his power is keeping me up nights."

"Yeah." Bobby looked at her. "There's that."

Bezaliel came through the door with Sagi and Talya following behind him. He looked at Ellie.

"What first?"

"Let's get everything cleared to that side and then we'll work our way through?" She glanced back at Bobby. "Pick a spot, Bobby, and we'll bring the documents to you."

5:30 am. October 15, 2012. Boise, Idaho

Garth cursed as the tool slipped again, too aware of the woman standing silently behind him. He could see her reflection in the car window. Katherine Grayson, a slender, elegant-looking woman in her mid-forties, with fine features and pale blonde hair, drawn back at the moment into a neat bun at the nape of her neck. She was too polite to look impatient but they'd been standing there for five minutes now while he tried to break into the car and he was horribly conscious that every minute was an exponentially rising chance for someone to see them.

He started when Katherine reached past him and gently removed the slim jim from his hand, sliding it between the glass and doorframe and unlatching the lock in a second.

"Takes a bit of practise." She smiled at him to take any sting from her action and opened the door.

"Yeah." He'd never even used one before, but of course she had. There probably weren't any hunters in the world as bad as he was.

"Do you know how to hot wire?"

"Not really." He stepped back as Katherine slid into the driver's seat. "Not really had the need to."

She nodded noncommittally and pulled a screwdriver from her jacket pocket. She slid the slot end into the ignition and turned it. Garth jumped as the engine turned over.

"With older cars, you can sometimes get lucky," she commented. "It's always worth a try. Get in."

He walked around the other side of the truck, opening the door and climbing in when she unlocked it. He barely had time to settle his pack on the floor before Katherine shifted into gear and pulled out onto the street.

Trent had missed her, but Twist made the introductions, and from him, Garth knew Katherine had gotten into hunting in her twenties, after a vampire attack on her husband had left her a widow. That was about all he knew of her, other than she seemed to be skilled in auto theft and wasn't prone to panicking.

She drove steadily and competently, obeying all the traffic rules and lights and pulled into the lot where they'd left Garth's four wheel drive. Garth got out of the car.

"See you back there." Katherine smiled at him, and pulled away, heading west. Garth nodded and got into the SUV, reversing out of the slot and following her taillights.

6:10 am. October 15, 2012. Warner Springs, California

"Frank gave us this?" Dean lay stretched out between two rocks in a shallow erosion gully, staring down at the naval base fifteen hundred below them through a pair of binoculars. Beside him, Sam was also lying flat, his own binoculars angled to the north.

"Yep. Said it was the easiest base to get onto."

"Doesn't look easy to me." Dean scowled at the miles of electrified wire netting, surveillance cameras and the acres of open ground between the big buildings.

"No." Sam adjusted the focus slightly as he found what he was looking for. "But there is one point that we can get in and out again without being very noticeable or having to fight our way."

Dean shifted onto his left elbow, and swept the glasses across. The perimeter road was just visible and he saw what Sam was looking at, a three foot wide culvert that led to an underground drainage tunnel.

"Which building holds the explosives?" Dean looked back at the main installation.

"The white one, on the western side."

He refocussed the glasses, moving them incrementally over the view he had. There it was. A wide grate that allowed water to run off the concrete aprons surrounding the buildings into the tunnel, just metres from the postern door in the delivery access roller door of the building. And there were no cameras on this side of the building, or the building next to it. Maybe Frank did know something.

"When do you want to go in?" Sam lowered the glasses and slipped them back into his pack.

"Guards were patrolling every hour until three a.m; we'll go straight in after that patrol and be out before the next one." Dean let the glasses drop to his chest. "These sort of jobs, I miss Ellie."

"Thanks."

He turned his head to grin at his brother. "C'mon, let's go."

They eased their way back off the ridge, staying low as they worked their way down the gully until they reached the hiking trail again. The deep blue car, covered in a fine layer of white dust now, sat where they'd left it, parked on the shoulder.

3:00 am

At three in the morning, the silence around the base was deep and unbroken. Sam shivered as the wind came tickling up from the desert to the west, looking at the broken cloud cover that, for once, was working for them.

Ahead of him, his brother was moving slowly toward the culvert, freezing periodically, his dark clothing rendering him a shadow against the drainage ditch. They had a limited time window, but neither man felt pressure to hurry, the job was too important to lose through impatience.

The tunnel was three feet wide by three feet high, a square of blackness under the road. Dean looked at it sourly. It was too small to even be able to crouch in; they'd be on their elbows and knees, crawling all the way in and all the way back.

"How much do we need?" Sam stared at the small opening, clearly thinking the same thing.

"Not much. A couple of cases, plus detonators will be fine." Dean sighed and crawled in, ducking his head and feeling the slippery growth of algae on the floor. He could feel Sam behind him, the occasional huff of breath at his heels.

Five hundred yards.

As a distance, Dean thought, it was nothing to walk, upright and with the wind on your face. It was, however, a long way to crawl, through the stench of decaying run off and occasional drowned animal remains. He tried to breathe shallowly, through his mouth, thinking of all the tunnels they'd roamed through over the years. In all fairness, this one didn't even make the top one hundred.

Under the grating, they leaned back against the sides of the tunnel, moonlight shining down on them as the clouds scudded fast across the sky. Dean checked his watch. In two minutes the patrol would be on its way back to the guard room and they could move.

It took both of them to lift the heavy grating, shifting it without letting it touch the ground, without making a noise that might catch someone's attention. Dean peered out at ground level. The entire area was empty and still. He climbed out and moved fast to the white building, picks already out. Sam followed him and stood in the shadows, his back to his brother, watching.

The lock took forty seconds, nothing fancy about it. Perhaps the powers that be figured the base security was good enough to skimp on the interior stuff. The door opened silently and Sam closed it behind them. Dean pulled out his pen light and pointed two fingers toward the far wall. He turned for the other side of the building, keeping the light partially cupped by his hand. The putty was stacked on shelves in an orderly fashion, easily found. The cases were a little bigger than they'd thought they be, each box holding seventy pounds. Detonators were in the middle, several kinds, packed in fifties into smaller boxes. Dean nodded to his brother and picked up a box of each kind. There was no telling what might be best in a given situation and it didn't hurt to be prepared.

The return trip up the tunnel took longer, pushing the boxes ahead of them as they crawled. At the tunnel's entrance, the big black duffle bags were where they'd left them and they packed the boxes into them, picking them up and working their way slowly back to the junction where they'd left the car.

Dean wrinkled his nose as they got in and closed the doors. "You know, you smell bad."

Sam glanced at him, mouth twisting in annoyance. "We smell bad, Dean. Let's just get off this road. West and north to Palm Desert. It's only an hour from there to Barstow."

Dean nodded, fingers curling around the wheel as he visualised the route. They'd keep to the centre of the state, on the smaller roads until they got back.

3.23 pm. October 15, 2012. Irma, Wisconsin

"So, Frank, you're all set up now, right?" Trent looked over Frank's shoulder at the bank of monitors in front of him.

"Yeah. I'm good." He glanced back at Trent. "You can get out of here. I'll feed the transmissions to Ellie and Ray as the data comes in."

"We've installed the alarms. You'll have about ten minutes warning from the road, about two minutes if they get to the edge of the field, and thirty seconds when they come into the barn."

Frank grinned humourlessly at him. "Ten minutes is enough time to send everything I have to Oregon. Other than that, well it's never been about getting to old age, has it?"

Trent's eyebrow lifted. "Speak for yourself. I intend on living to a hundred."

"Good luck with that."

"Take it easy, Frank." Trent nodded to Sariel and Oran, and they left the trailer. He set the alarm on the barn, and the other two as they exited the zones. He hoped that Frank would alright here on his own for the next week. It was only four miles across country from Roman's building, although by road it was closer to fifteen.

He sighed as he got into the truck. From the passenger seat, Sariel looked across at him.

"What's wrong?"

Trent shrugged. "Never have a good feeling leaving someone alone in the field."

"Do you think the leviathans could locate him?" Oran leaned forward from the back seat.

"I don't know. We don't know enough about them." He started the truck and started down the road, looking around. "We know they're hip to our technology, managed to identify the Winchesters straight out of the box, practically. But as to whether they've furthered that or not, we'll have to wait and see."

"If they were capable of such technology as it would take, I think we'd all be dead by now." Sariel looked out the window.

"Maybe. But they've got their own agenda and their own timetable. Maybe they're just too busy at the moment to worry about us." Trent scratched his brow. "As soon as we start stirring them up, we'll know what they've got."

"Yes, they'll come after us then."

5.50 am. October 16, 2012. Scotts Mills, Willamette Valley, Oregon

Ellie came straight up from deep sleep when the bedroom door opened, her hand curling around the SIG that lay under the pillow. She lay still, waiting. A soft footfall across the rug and the sound of a zipper made her lips curve into a smile and she released the gun, rolling over slowly to look at the man undressing beside the bed.

"Hey."

Dean startled. "Hey, sorry, I didn't want to wake you."

"S'okay. How'd you do?" She used her elbows to push higher against the pillows.

"Got it all." He pulled back the covers and slid into the bed next to her, one arm easing under her neck, the other curving around her, under the upright bulge of her stomach. "C'mere."

She lay in his arms, listening to the quiet beat of his heart. "You okay?"

"Mmmm … just missed you," he said against her hair. "Sam and me, driving through the night, too much like old times."

She lifted her hand and stroked his cheek, and he sighed, moving his head to meet her lips. The kiss was very gentle at first, soothing the worries he'd held locked up while he'd been away, softening the tensions in his body. Jus' like coming home, he thought drowsily. I am home.

Her hands slid over him, smoothing over his skin, stroking him, and he exhaled deeply. He opened his eyes and looked into hers, sinking into their deep serenity, his hands moving over her in the same easy rhythm, stroking, rubbing, caressing without heat until desire kindled gradually in both of them. He kissed her neck, letting his mouth trail over the sensitive area in the hollow of her collarbone, tasting her unobtrusively, her scent filling his nostrils as she rolled over to lie on her side. He pressed himself against her back, his hands following the curves of her body. He felt unhurried, peaceful, savouring the sensations he was feeling, that he was creating for her.

He shifted down a little, and his fingers found her, wet and ready for him. That jolted through him, hardening him abruptly. He pushed in gently, through the tight folds, into a velvet heat that tightened around him, and his eyes closed, his breath rushing out as he moved, very slowly, inside of her. His hand slipped over the taut skin of her belly, reaching around to cup her breast, thumb rubbing over her nipple. His left arm was under her, hand by her cheek, and she reached up to lace her fingers with his, two gold bands gleaming side by side in the near-darkness.

For a few hours on the drive back to Oregon, he'd been…disoriented, he supposed. Looking at his brother in the passenger seat, the Camaro's V8 engine sounding like the Impala, the night pressed close around them, the highway stretching out in front…he'd had to make an effort to remember when it was, the sense that they'd travelled back in time strong and persistent.

It had scared the crap out of him, thinking that nothing of the last year had occurred, that maybe it had been a dream and when he got tired they'd stop at a motel and he would wake in the morning to another life. The sight of the house, lights still burning in some rooms, at the end of the road had been a relief, but not as much as her voice in the dark when he'd come into the bedroom.

She pushed back against him, moaning softly, and he kissed her neck again, holding her closer as they rocked together, their climax a slowly wandering, upward spiral.

11:00 am.

Ellie waited as the phone rang in the store across the country. Katherine would be mad at her for the wedding. Not that she and Seb could've gotten there easily anyway, or that anyone was prepared to do the gathering thing when it made too clear a target to the Levis. She hadn't even invited Kasha or Fionnula for fear of what might happen. Her face screwed up as she recognised she was practising her excuses for the older woman.

"Hidden Door, can I help you?"

"Yes, I'm looking for a particular work by Aphra Behn—"

"We have several editions you might be interested in." Katherine's voice was cool and unemotional. "If you like, I can get a list and call you back?"

"That would be very good, thank you." She hung up and waited. The code to call back was the name of the author and the number to call a predetermined order of page numbers in the most popular work. Ray had devised the simple ruse and was watching the numbers in Florida. He'd designate new information to both Katherine's landline number and to the burner phone here to ensure that the call was as secure as he could make it.

The cell phone rang and Ellie hit the call button. "Katherine?"

"Well, well, Mrs Winchester," Katherine's voice crackled for a moment over the line then cleared. "What have you got to say for yourself?"

"I'm sorry—"

"Don't be silly, Ellie," Katherine cut her off. "I wish I'd been there and Seb is fit to be tied with regret at not being able to give you away, but we're delighted."

At the words, tears rushed to fill Ellie's eyes and she swallowed hard against them. "Oh…I wish you'd been here too."

"When we get rid of the problems, we'll do something about it, yes?" Katherine didn't wait for an answer. "But this isn't why you called."

"No," Ellie said. "Have you ever heard of an occult or arcane society called Disciplina Pertitia Occultae? It would be old, maybe pre-Christian?"

"No. What it's in relation to?"

"I'm trying to find a possible ritual used by Hell, and the name came up as a potential resource. It was supposed to be known to the Church, but when I called Patrick, he hung up on me as soon as I mentioned it," Ellie said, realising how much that had worried her as the words spilled out.

"Hang on a moment, let me ask Seb," Katherine said. Ellie could hear the soft clunk of the phone being put down then distant and indistinct noises filling the line.

Maybe it wasn't important. Maybe the society was still in existence and was sensitive for some other reason, she considered as she waited. Something to do with the bad press the Church had been getting in the last twenty years. Something embarrassing or shameful. It was possible.

There was a light scraping noise in her ear, then Katherine's voice filled the line. "We have two references: one is fourth century, in Alexandreia; the other is twelfth century, in Jordan. Both are just footnotes, really, to works about other groups. The society is mentioned in passing, being a group or school for scholars of hidden knowledge—except the translation suggests more like dangerous knowledge, knowledge that can't be revealed—and both use the same symbol in the seals and letters."

"What symbol?"

"A unicursal hexagram, not so uncommon in itself," Katherine said. "It's been used by many groups in the occult over time."

"Yes." Ellie frowned as some detail tugged at her memory when she called the shape to mind. "Thanks, Katherine."

"Ellie, what's the ritual you're looking for? And why?"

"I'm not even sure if it exists," Ellie said. "Dean and I went to raise Michael from the pit, and we overheard two of the archdemons talking of it—a way to bring Lucifer back to power, to give him his own body and soul."

"What?"

The older woman's shock was clear over the line, and Ellie was unsure if the shock was hearing of them going into Hell or a ritual to embody and ensoul the devil.

"The Watchers said it had to do with the lines, the bloodlines of the fallen angels and they said if anyone had records of such a ritual, it might be this society," she explained. "The trouble is, we don't know how the bloodlines could affect a human soul in a way that might make it different from any other soul. There are a lot of descendents from the angels, these aren't nephilim they're talking about, they're just people."

"Is there anything that you're using to narrow the search?"

"Just the bloodlines of the Irin and the Grigori, and any mythology, rumour or legend from Heaven about Lucifer."

"That's…broad." Katherine's dissatisfaction came across the line clearly and Ellie made a face at the phone.

"I know." She shrugged. "That's all I've got to go on."

"What are the rest of your people doing?"

"Trying to limit the Leviathan progress, develop a virus against them, find a way to kill them, and listening for any signs of Hell's Horde rising."

There was a moment of silence as Katherine digested that, then she responded, her voice low. "We'll look as well, Ellie. I'll get Fionnula and Kasha onto it too; they can route their findings back through us."

"Thanks," Ellie said, standing. "But Katherine, make sure you only use Ray's routing to communicate with any of them. The Levis are definitely using the NSA offices to track phone traffic. No matter how careful you think you're being, it's too easy for them to pull off a voice print or flag even key words and I don't want you at risk. I'll use the Lepidopterology forum to give you information as we find it. Send any messages with anything you find through that."

"Will do," Katherine promised. "And Ellie, take care of yourself as well. You promised me godmother."

Ellie laughed. "I did at that. Tell Seb to keep you both safe."

She ended the call and walked to the counter. The sense of time moving faster, of events gathering impetus and speed all on their own, hit her again. It should have been easier for them now, with resources and working together. Instead, it seemed to be getting harder and harder.