Sacrifice – chpt 6 – s.n. fic.

by: sifi

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"Dean…" Sam said softly while taking in the carnage. Beside him, Dean nodded.

"Yeah…bad… in so many ways, just…" he held out his hand sensing Sam about to move, "…don't move… we don't need traceable shoe prints…" he said moving quickly and carefully across the foyer, toward the dining room where he knew Sam had left the bell, "Keep the gun up Sam…that…thing could still be around here…"

"Dean…" he said, this time a sense of warning in his voice.

"I will… you too…gimme three minutes…"

Sam nodded keeping his eyes peeled up the staircase and alternately between the halls on either side of it while Dean stepped on cats' paws around the limbs and pools of liquid leathery blood that Pollock'd the marble flooring. From his vantage he could see a black clad leg on the right hand side of the staircase and what he thought might be the head of a humerus Or it could be the head of a femur…hard to say from this angle… he thought as the scent of hot copper, underlaid with the all too easily discernable fragrance of rotting meat meandered into him. God… Dean hurry up man… I don't know how long I can hold my hurl…what did this? he wondered as the pure savagery of the attack left him shaking his head.

It started as a pinch in the area of his third eye, the pinch rapidly progressing into a poke and finally ending with the sense of some enormous spike being driven into his forehead, a crude heavy iron nail, a precursor to perhaps the kind the Romans had used to crucify Jesus felt hammered, millimeter by millimeter into his head and he fell to his knees, the shotgun a distant and unacknowledged memory in his right hand as seething hatred swirled around him, silver turned fire orange with fury as impotent rage sounded and rolled within his skull but there was more; coupled, married to the rage was despairing grief for a blood line lost to folly and he knew nothing as his 21st century body screamed inside of itself at time, fate and pride, his mind was cast back once again to a time long before his own.

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"My lord, I can only feel the righteousness of your quest… the Gods themselves will sing your praises… only the most fearless of men would dare to breech the heavens! Think of what this will mean to the generations to come… Your words, your WILL transmitted to the heavens… your glory my King!" Sam felt his mouth say, though once again he found himself unable to keep from speaking.

Please don't listen to him! Please… my king! King Nebuchadnezzer please do not heed his folly…I beg you ... keep your own council! Please!... Sam Winchester felt himself plead and knew it was futile. History had already been written.

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Dean slid stealthily through the swinging door into the formal dining room where he knew Martin Turnbull's family had last been whole.

He knew they'd been turned to stone, he knew they were statues but the devastation he saw upon entering the formal dining room was almost too much for even his finely honed hunter's senses. It was his humanity that buckled when he found himself confronted with piles of rubble where the statues had been left behind. Ah no… can we undo this?... these people… Martin's family…please don't let this be unfixable… he pleaded inside, feeling empathy sting at the back of his eyes as his lips pressed together, wondering how he was going to break it to the boy if they couldn't find a way to bring them back. It's supposed to be the voice of God… It's supposed to manifest needs and a boy needs his family! he swept his gaze over the table, in particular the area Sam had been sitting that night. It's not here… Damnit! I KNEW it! I FREAKING KNEW it was gonna be gone… who the hell else…? That thing…whatever it was that pushed me down the stairs? But Why? I don't understand… unless it can use the bell… oh shit no… we gotta fix this and destroy that damned thing! he began to understand the Rabbi's fear as he ducked to all fours and examined the floor just to make sure it hadn't fallen or rolled from the table. Could be buried under one of the piles that used to be PEOPLE! I need Sam… "Sam!" he called.

He heard the door to the dining room open as he approached the pile of rubble nearest Sam's position the other night and raised his hand to sift through it then stopped, "Dude, do you think it'll make much difference if we…" he stopped and swallowed hard then shook his head in a 'yes/no' gesture, "…sift through the pieces? I mean…" his breath caught as something grasped his ankles and jerked his knees out from under him then dragged him from beneath the table while his hands clutched futilely at the woolen rug held firm by the weight of the mahogany. "Sam! Get in here!" he called feeling his body slamming heavy chairs out of the way as he was dragged the length of the table, finally his hands finding purchase on one of the legs as he fought against his attacker.

The last time something had managed to grab him like that he'd wound up in a subterranean cell for two days terrified that every breath Sam drew was going to be his last, and that there was nothing he could do to save him. The time Laura threw him out of the veiled realm didn't count… she hadn't hurt him nor intended anything other than to protect him.

"Son of a bitch!" he yelled trying to pull himself free of the monstrous grip that just wouldn't be escaped, "Let go of me you bastard!... Sam! If you hurt my brother I'll send you straight to hell!" he cursed and lost his grip on the table leg.

The world spun upside down for a moment as his body was slammed into a wall and held there, pinned to the hard plaster surface and turning like the second hand on a wall clock until he was upright again and staring into seething silver eyes that appeared to move within themselves as if they were made of rolling smoke. The face before him was furious but despite the rage that seemed to bathe him in fiery heat he couldn't feel any genuine or personal malice aimed at him.

"Wha…what are you?" he stammered then steeled, "…if you hurt my brother…so help me God… I'll find a way to…" he stopped as the face before him cocked a brow ridge expectantly, a thoroughly human gesture that took him completely off guard and sent chills up his spine, "…kill you…" he finished weakly and watched as the mouth of the disembodied swirling smoky head opened, the representation of lips rolling back in what Dean was more than certain would have been a belly laugh of epic proportions if it could have made the sound. Dean smiled awkwardly with a nodding shrug, Okay… at least it's not trying to rip my organs out through my skin… that's a plus…I hope…Please Sammy be okay… Please man… whatever funky stuff's happening to you, please just be alright... God we need to find that bell and get all this stuff fixed then destroy it…

The silvery smoky head tilted to the side, its brow ridges seeming to furrow, as if it heard his thoughts. The image swirled back from him and began to change shape, bowing here and pulling there until it was a representation of the front hall, complete with image of Sam on his side but Dean couldn't tell if that meant he was dead or unconscious. He strained against the invisible force holding him to the wall but he was no more successful in the face of this being than he'd been against Big Bad, "Is he alive?" he demanded, "What did you do to him!"

The creature's representation began to alter again, it became a larger version of Sam that showed exaggerated breathing movements, communicating in the only way it could.

Dean watched carefully and noted the movement, "He's alive?...what did you do to him!" he asked wincing as the portion of the entity that gave the illusion that it was Sam's head literally superimposed itself over Deans.

He opened his eyes slowly having felt nothing horrible, terrifying or painful like when Eddy Jay had laid all those atrocities into his mind and left him drowning in it.

This time what he was seeing was a plateau with an enormous valley spread out below, all in varying shades of swirling grayish silver. He could see the occupants of the valley busy, bustling here and there, building the foundations of what was certain to be a great city in due time, "Wow…" he breathed impressed with the scope and scale that was represented to him, "…a vision… you gave him a vision?" he asked as the images faded and the silver mist coalesced well away from him now, to become the face it had been in the beginning.

"What do you want?" Dean asked and felt the pressure holding him against the wall ease enough for him to regain his footing on the floor. Part of him was tempted to dodge the hell out of there and get to Sam, but he didn't think that this little bit of trust would be best served that way. Though he had no reason to feel that this entity meant no malice, other than the fact that it hadn't killed him or Sam yet Or so it said… it could be lying… yeah it could but I don't think so… it was definitely making effort to communicate far beyond the standard parameters of the average ghost, poltergeist, or angry spirit. That fact alone gave Dean Winchester serious pause for consideration.

Once again the head seemed to listen to his internal workings then began to shift its form again, this time showing Dean a different perspective on this afternoon's rooftop encounter. He saw himself racing across the roof as the image of his little brother turned to face him and nearly flew back as though knocked over. He saw himself reach out, his hand grasp Sam's wrist as his body fell hard onto the surface of the rooftop, his hand holding his brother, his hand the only thing between Sam and a deadly plummet.

"Help!... You want help…" he realized, "…so when you pushed me down the stairs you weren't trying to kill me?" he asked watching the smoke alter yet again, returning to the face he was beginning to see more details of, and he recognized the scowl that told him, 'no' it hadn't been trying to kill him.

"Help with what?" he asked mystified.

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His footsteps 'shooshed' down the orange hued corridor as he strode purposefully toward the nearly finished throne room where the king had summoned him.

His eyes darted left and right marking the position of the guards who stood stonily and ever observant at their posts. Neither of them made a move toward him and he knew that so far, he was still in his majesty's good graces.

"My king…" he said curiously as he drew to the pawn's side.

Nebuchadnezzer turned his head and raised his right arm, sweeping it outward toward the new city beneath their feet.

"Etemenanki my old friend… look at what you have inspired… the Temple of the Seven Lights of the Earth is being re-born… we shall grace the heavens ourselves and bask in the glory of the Gods themselves… My kingdom Babylon will live in homage to the Gods of creation and will be the greatest city in all the known world… people will come from all the corners just to stand on its blessed soil… and all this you inspired my friend," he smiled dropping a warm hand onto the shoulder Sam wore.

NO! Well okay, build the city but DON'T build the tower! Please… Oh God help me get through to him…but I can't and I can't change history and I know it… Why am I seeing this? Why? What am I supposed to be learning from this? he pleaded inside, flexing the muscles of his memory to glean some understanding of why he was having these visions of such a far away past, and how it could pertain to what they were up against in the 21st century. Sam felt Etemenanki turn his head and felt his eyes fall into the deep coffee colored eyes of Nebuchadnezzar. He felt himself lurch and the world spun madly for a moment all around him, Oh great another chance for psychic spew…man that's nauseating… he thought taking in his new position.

Before him an older king of Babylon paced forcefully across the open air balcony, his hair was now lightly salted and his body, though still more than formidable seemed just a little softer, his face a little more inscribed by time. Behind him the fabled tower reached upward, so tall already that its pinnacle could not be seen within the confines of the opening in the wall. How far along are they? Sam wondered and tried to rise to his feet, tried to gain or exercise some control over the body he inhabited but all he could do was sit helplessly inside this husk and watch as history unfolded all around him.

What good is it for me to see this if I can't change anything? he questioned angrily.

"My king this…tragedy is lamentable surely… yet do you not think these men, who've given their lives to build the tower would desire for you to stop now? When you are so very close to the heavens where they have strove so hard to put you?... Nay my king… conversely… perhaps it is time to redouble the efforts of the men… they can taste the pinnacle at hand… to delay would be to steal the very heart from their breasts my king…" Oh my God would you shut up! Stop it! Jeez man don't listen to this b.s. he's full of crap! He's just trying to manipulate you! Don't fall for it… Please! Sam groaned inside his head wondering how anyone could fall for such duplicity then realizing that it was only the distance of history that gave him the ability to perceive the manipulation, and he felt just a little ashamed at himself. But what about the bell? Where, well when…there's still so far to go… he realized.

Sam knew he was going to have to watch this tragedy unfold to completion before he could fully understand what it all meant. He knew that somehow he would be here when the tower was struck down once more, and the greatest metropolis in biblical history fell to ruin, but what he didn't know was whether he would survive it. After all, he'd never heard of Etemenanki, that he knew of.

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tbc,

I think I may have given away too much, have I made it too obvious?

Please let me know what you're thinking,

Thanks,

sifi