Eye of the Storm

Disclaimer: Don't own Supernatural in any way. I do own Haley Winchester and Laura Whitman.

Author's Note: Originally chapter six was supposed to be Unmasked, but I found I liked where it ended too well to do the 'unmasking' the title spoke of, so it was moved to this chapter. Also, vague reference to some early chapters of Heart of Gold early on in this chapter. Can anyone guess what that reference is? No Dean or Haley (more or less) in this chapter. I hope it's okay, it hasn't been beta'd.

Review Answers:

Kiss of Death – Good, this is good news. Oh, the last chapter? What was shocking about it? Or do you mean Chapter six? I'm confused. But anyway, glad you're liking it.

Spuffyshipper – Thankyou. Really? I've always imagined her as a tough, street-wise kind of person, sort of like a female Dean, just toning down on the constant flirting, as well as a couple of other things. At least, that's how she'd be portrayed in this story (should she ever become unpossessed), so that's why I thought she just fit with Dean. Plus (and this could be stretching it a little) I could have sworn I noticed chemistry (mostly one-sided on Meg's part )between her and Dean in Devil's Trap before they started the exorcism. Glad you liked it (though I must be honest, I would've gone on with it whether you did or not). Here's some more for you to read.

EmSyd – Thankyou, here's more.

Ghostwriter – Yay, thank you, such good compliments. Keeping up as fast as I can.

The Great and Powerful Oz – Yeah, he has this tendency not to listen when he's busy like that. Lol, don't worry, no such plans like that, even if her body was capable of it (but honestly, falling fro ma seven story building, I doubt she even could right now, what with her body being broken and all). Lol, always good when the fans get addictive. Well, I think so anyway. Just stay behind the security fence and no one will get hurt. Except Sam (because he seems to get hurt regardless of what anyone does). And Meg (because we all now what's going to happen to her… don't we?).

Chapter 7: Unmasked

Sam could feel her slide over his body like liquid, felt her slender hands trace along his chest and down his arms, her lips and tongue playing with his neck. He took comfort in her presence, trying to reach up to her, but his arms refused to move. In fact, his whole body felt stiff, like he was boxed in.

And she was leaving. It felt as though he was being submerged beneath freezing water right after bathing in the sun's warmth. His breath quickened and he tried to reach for her again, tried to call out to her. She was nothing more then a disembodied warmth, a thought with which he comforted himself. But she was there, whether by his imagination or not, and he couldn't bear to be without her.

His eyes snapped open, and he cried out in the darkness. That's all there was, all he could see, all he could feel. His body was stiff, aching with every attempt at movement, but he didn't stop struggling, even when he felt as though his hand were being cut off by those damned ropes, even when his knees and elbows were bruised and sore from being rammed into the walls of his prison.

"No," He cried out, reaching out desperately for Haley, even though she was long gone, if she was ever there at all. He reached out with all he had. "Bring her back. Bring her back!" He cried out in as a burst of energy escaped him, sending blinding pain through his head. Somewhere below him, he heard something akin to a small explosion.

If his hands had been free, they'd be massaging his temples where he was sure someone had two power drills slowly digging through his skull. For a brief moment, darkness gave way to confusion and pain, and despite himself, Sam welcomed it. Anything was better then being alone in the darkness again.

He gave a startled jerk as a loud bang sounded above him. A second later, the roof seemed to be pulled away and through the confusing haze that had fallen across his mind, Sam thought he recognized the clerk from the service station.

"What do you think you're playing at, huh?" He demanded. Sam tried to shy away from him, tried to press himself against the back of the… he suddenly realized something: he was in the trunk of a car. "Well?" Sam looked back up at the clerk, not saying anything. To be perfectly honest he wasn't really sure what the man was talking about.

As if realizing this, he reached down and lifted Sam partly from the trunk by the back of his jacket, and forced him to look down at the right-back tyre. To Sam's surprise, there was a rather large hole in it. How had the clerk managed to drive so far with a tyre like that?

"Well?" The clerk repeated. Sam just turned his fearful, confused gaze at him.

"I… I don't understand." He said meekly. The clerk narrowed his eyes at the younger man.

"You did something, I felt it." He stated coldly. "That hocus-pocus you people like to do." Sam narrowed his eyes for two reasons. The first, being that the clerk had said 'you people'. Did that mean he wasn't a demon? That he was, in fact, human? Sam really didn't want to believe that human could willingly ally himself with demons. But then again, he'd seen far too much evil done ever by humans to be surprised by it.

The second reason being the use of the word 'hocus-pocus'. He tried to remember, but the last few minutes since waking up were… blurry for some reason. And his head still ached like someone was trying to drill into his brain.

And then he remembered. The raw, desperate need to not be on his own anymore, and then the burst of energy that had seemed to fly out of him… right before he'd heard that hole getting punched into the tyre.

"S-sorry?" He said hesitantly. He wasn't sure what good an apology was going to do; this guy didn't seem too fond of 'the hocus-pocus' as he'd called it.

The clerk made an irritated noise, and then pulled Sam from the trunk by his jacket, dropping him onto the road.

Sam landed on his chest, but quickly rolled over, looking up at his captor, who now had a small hand gun trained on Sam's chest.

"You so much as try and move, and I'll put a bullet in you, demon or no demon, got it?" The man said warningly. Sam nodded quickly, though he didn't understand what demons had to do with it. Maybe he wasn't supposed to be hurt or something, though that didn't make much sense.

So Sam just laid there and watched while the clerk heaved a spare tyre from one side of the trunk (no wonder Sam had been so squashed in there), rolled it around, and proceeded to change tyres.

Sam realized he had tears in his eyes, and tried to blink them away before the clerk turned his attention back to him. He wondered if they were from the pain in his head or the fear of being put back in the trunk. Either way, neither possibility seemed to be going away any time in the near future.

All too soon, the tyre change was done, and the blown tyre was rolled to the side of the road, where the clerk left it. Then he turned to Sam, who had done as he was told and remained still the entire time.

"Are you going to get in yourself or do I have to lift you in?" The clerk demanded, gesturing towards the open trunk with his gun. Wanting to avoid as much physical contact with his captor as possible, Sam struggled to his feet, and walked unsteadily over to the car. He hesitantly tried to climb back into the trunk, but ended falling practically head-first into it. After a moment of manoeuvring using mostly his leg, he managed to get himself in as comfortable position as he could be in the small space.

With a grunt, the clerk slammed the door down on Sam, throwing him once more into darkness. With a small gulp, Sam closed his eyes. It was easier to pretend the darkness wasn't there if he couldn't see it. Or more, if couldn't see that he was, for all intents and purposes, completely blind.

-;-

Jim and Elkins had been tracking the demons for the better part of the day before finally getting somewhere. That somewhere happened to be a cemetery, surprise, surprise.

To be more specific, one of the crypts near the back of the cemetery. And then down through the bottom of one of the caskets into a hidden passageway. What was it with demons and hidden passageways under caskets?

It had now become obvious that some of the demons had broke off from the original group and led Jim and Elkins away from the right tunnel. In the end they had become lost.

They'd been walking for almost an hour maybe (the tunnels continued to crisscross through each other) before the tunnel opened out into a large chamber, which turned out to be a dead end. To their left was a plain stone table that seemed to be set up as an altar. To their right was a single tall, stone pillar, just wide enough for person to reach around and put their hands together around the other side.

"I think we may have found the ceremony room." Jim said. He expected a grunt of agreement from Elkins; the man certainly wasn't one for words. But all he was met with was silence. He turned around, but there was nobody there. "Elkins?" He said, looking around. "Daniel?" He spun around, hearing something moving behind him. Nothing was there.

"Who's there?" He called. Another flash of movement, but when he turned to it, it was gone. It moved like a shadow, but he could almost feel it nearby. It was definitely more then a mere shadow.

He pulled a consecrated dagger from his belt. Even with their apparent invulnerability to physical harm, just about any demon he knew of would back down if stabbed with this particular dagger.

He heard someone coming up behind him. He spun around, raising the dagger in preparation for the demon's attack – and found himself face-to-face with his niece, who had a somewhat surprised look on her face, eyes focused on the dagger. Jim took a deep breath slouching back against the wall while Laura continued to stare at the dagger.

"Were you going to stab me?" She asked.

"I didn't know it was you," Jim said. Laura nodded, as if satisfied. Jim suddenly realized something. "Aren't you supposed to be with Sam?" He asked, straightening up.

"Yeah. Those Winchesters can't go anywhere without attracting demonic attention." Laura said. Jim frowned, but guessed that the demons had attacked and Laura had been brought here. She must've escaped, seeing as there didn't appear to be any demons nearby. "Where's Elkins?" She asked, as if only just now realizing the vampire hunter was nowhere in sight.

"To be honest… I'm not sure." Jim said, glancing around the room. "Well, actually, I have a suspicion. I just hope I'm wrong."

"A suspicion?" Laura asked, clearly intrigued. Jim glanced at his niece, and then nodded.

"John spoke with me this morning, before we split up." He explained. "He suspected that the Demon had possessed one of our comrades. And…" He glanced around, as if expecting Elkins to suddenly materialize out of thin air. "I think our old friend is said comrade." He looked over at Laura, and caught a brief look of concern on her face before she nodded.

"So, Elkins, possessed by a demon…" She said.

"Not a demon." Jim said, and Laura looked up. "The Demon." Laura raised an eyebrow; judging by the look on her face, she actually found the idea… well, she didn't seem worried, that was for sure. "What is it?" Jim asked.

"Oh, I just think it's funny to think that the Demon would waste time possessing a washed up old vampire hunter like Daniel Elkins." She said with a shrug. Now it was Jims turn to raise an eyebrow, confused by his niece's attitude. Laura just continued to smile in a non-committal way.

-;-

Sam had never actually travelled in the trunk of a car before. Sure, Dean had threatened to do it to him on more then one occasion, but he had never followed through on the threat (although he came rather close at one point when Sam was sixteen). A part of Sam now wished he had, so at least he'd have been prepared for it, and maybe even know how to deal with how suffocatingly close the walls around him were.

He was afraid to try and use the telekinesis again. Even if he had known how to properly trigger it, he was unsure if he would. Something the clerk had said when he'd opened the trunk.

"That hocus-pocus you people like to do."

You people. As far as he was concerned, there didn't seem to be a difference between Sam and the demons the guy was working with. A thought that had occurred to Sam on more then one occasion. Where did these gifts come from? Were they good, or bad? The pain Sam was continually assault with every time he got a vision or used his telekinesis (Admittedly, he'd only used that a couple of times) had him leaning frighteningly towards bad.

And that scared him, because he didn't want to be bad. He didn't want to be a tool of the Demon he'd hunted his whole life. Tears returned unbidden to his eyes, and he tried to wipe them away without thinking, which brought him crashing back to reality as a burning pain shot through him as the ropes dug into the already raw flesh of his wrists. He gave a small whimper of pain and then bit down on his tongue to keep from making anymore noise.

He was so busy trying to ignore the many points of pain in his body that it took him a minute to realize they'd stopped again. And he thought he heard voices just outside, though they were muffled by the thickness of the trunk. He strained to hear what they were saying, but the actual words were lost on him. One of the voices, which sounded female, sounded a little angry though.

A moment later, the trunk was once again opened, and Sam let out an exasperated groan despite the situation he was in.

"As if this night couldn't get any worse." He muttered. Meg smiled down at him.

"Oh, that's so nice of you to say, Sam." She said mock-cheerfully. "Although I must admit, I'm a little disappointed. The fact that you're stuck in the trunk of a car doesn't say much about your hunting skills. Did you even know my little… friend was behind you before he stuck that big ugly think into your head?" A muscle in Sam's jaw twitched, but he didn't say anything.

"Hey, I've got a deadline here." Said the clerk irritably from up the front of the car. Meg sighed.

"We've got plenty of time," she said in a bored voice. She turned her attention back to Sam, who seemed to be much more interesting. He wasn't sure yet if that was a good thing or a bad thing. "I ran into your brother, Sam." She said, and he looked up before he could stop himself. "He's…" She seemed to be searching for the right word. "… changed, since the last time I saw him."

"What did you do to him?" Sam demanded, trying to sound more confident then he felt. Meg raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, come on, Sammy, I say he's changed and you automatically assume I had something to do with it?" Meg asked, pretending to be hurt. "What did I ever do to deserve such horrible suspicions?"

"Well, let's start with the bit where you captured my brother and me and tried to use us as bait to lure our father into a trap, and work forward from there." Sam said, glaring at her. Meg smiled.

"Ah, yes. Good times." She said with a mocking smile, as if reliving fond memories. After a minute, she turned her gaze back on Sam. "Well, as much as I'd like to keep chatting with you, what our friend up the front said was true. There is a deadline, and you really don't want to see the boss if we're late…" She stared down at Sam, "… especially for something as important as this." Sam swallowed, not liking the way she'd been looking at him when she said those last few words.

She raised her hands to lower the top of the trunk back down, and Sam cringed involuntarily. Meg raised an eyebrow, a twisted smile spreading on her lips. "Aw, is little Sammy afraid of the dark?" She asked a childish voice, crouching down so her face was closer to Sam's. "Would he like to sit up front with the grown ups?" She taunted him. Sam glared at her, but didn't say anything. She licked her lips. "If I hadn't already had my fill of Winchester testosterone, you'd be on the backseat already." She said. Sam's eyebrows rose in spite of himself; what did she mean by that?

'Her fill of Winchester testosterone'? He thought, not really sure he wanted to know what she meant.

"What's it gonna be, Sammy?" She asked. Sam tried to turn away from her, to hide the fact that in some deep, dark, twisted corner of his mind, some part of him was attracted to Meg. Or at least enjoyed her attention. Sam tried very hard to pretend that part of him didn't exist.

But Meg reached down and held him by the chin so he was forced to look at her. "Well?" She demanded. He tried unsuccessfully to suppress shudder as she ran a sharp fingernail down his cheek, just heavy enough to be painful but not actually break the skin.

And then he wrenched his head from her grip, his face set in a mask of determination. "I'll take my chances with the dark." He said, though inside he dreaded having the trunk closed again. A muscle in Meg's jaw twitched, and she got to her feet.

"Suit yourself," She said coldly, and then gave Sam wicked smile. "Nightey-night." She said, and closed the trunk of the car down on Sam, plunging him once more into darkness.

-;-

How long they'd been travelling through the every crisscrossing tunnels, Jim wasn't sure. They'd left the ceremony chamber rather hurriedly (no telling how soon the Demon planned on arriving), perhaps a little too hurriedly, as they appeared to have become utterly lost.

Or so Jim thought, until Laura suddenly pulled him back down the tunnel they'd just come through, just as a group of voices reached his ears. What they were saying, he couldn't quite make out, but he could tell they were excited about something.

"Demons?" He guessed, glancing at Laura, who nodded, putting a finger to her lips and backing against the wall of the tunnel. She gestured in the direction of the voices, and it was clear she intended to hide; probably the smart thing to do, considering there was definitely more then one, and even together, he and Laura probably wouldn't have stood much chance against a single demon.

And he'd had every intention of keeping to the shadows as Laura was, until the demons came into his line of vision. His eyes widened when he saw who the two demons were supporting between them.

"Sam." He whispered. The youngest Winchester appeared to be unconscious, his feet dragged behind him as the demons carried him down the tunnel. Tightening his hold on the dagger, he tried to think of a way to catch the demons by surprise, as well as how to subdue them without risking getting Sam hurt.

"What do you think you're doing?" Laura demanded, staring at her uncle, clearly surprised he wasn't hiding.

"They have Sam with them." Jim stated, and Laura looked over to see that they did indeed have Sam. She turned back to her uncle. "Well, we can't just leave him with them." Jim said. Laura bit her lip, glancing back at the demons.

They had lowered to the ground Sam to the ground and disappear down one of the tunnels, though Jim doubted they were going to be gone for very long.

"Now's our chance." He said, moving past Laura. "We can hopefully get him out of here before they get back." He'd taken only a few steps when he felt Laura hand on his shoulder. She spun him around, staring straight into his eyes.

"I can't let you do that." She said, not breaking eye contact. He gave her a confused look. Without batting an eyelash, Laura raised a jagged-bladed knife. Jim's eyes widened in shock as he saw the knife, a split second later, Laura had plunged it straight into the side his neck.

He gasped in shock, blood pouring from the open wound as she pulled the knife back out of him. "Goodnight, Uncle," She sneered as he fell from her grip, dead within seconds of hitting the ground.

She stared down at her uncles body for a few seconds, her eyes filled with a sick, twisted hunger, and she licked her lips. Then she blinked, and when her eyes opened again, her pupils were a horrid, sickly yellow.

-;-

A/N: Chapter 7 finished, and it turned out better then I expected. A little piece of trivia: the little ending between Laura and Jim was inspired by the episode of Angel where Cordelia kills Lilah. In fact, Laura was actually based on Cordelia. Don't look at me like that, I thought she was cool when she was evil! Creepy, but cool.

Now, I hope there aren't too many problems with me killing Pastor Jim. I mean, come on, he was killed within the first five minutes of the first episode he was in on the show, it should've been obvious he was on borrowed time (or something like that) in this story. And it just seemed like the ideal way to reveal just who (or more, what) Laura is. Please tell me, how obvious did I make it (even in the first part of this chapter that she was in) that she was possessed? I hope it wasn't too obvious, I like to have surprises like that and they're never as fun if I'm not good at covering them up.

But anyway, moving on from the business with Laura, what did y'all think of the chapter in general? I realized a large part of it was spent in the trunk of a car… don't ask me why I felt the need to do that, I just thought it'd be fun to make good on the threats Dean seems to throw at Sam every few fics I read (did that sentence make sense?). I think I know what's going to be happening in the next chapter (if I'm right it shouldn't take too long to get it done).