Thank you so, so much for reading! I hope you enjoy this chapter!

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I do not own Supernatural, or any other TV Shows, Movies, Books, and/or Songs referenced in this story.

Chapter Warnings: Okay, this is a rough one. Victoria is once more dreaming about Lucifer. There are also mentions of self-harm; this is in order to try and remove the grace. Panic attacks are mentioned in this chapter as well as the discussion of Victoria's violation while kidnapped.

Chapter 23

Reality

Victoria Doyle sat reading about the various monsters that began with a "C" with a coffee pot beside her and a pack of gummy worms next to her notes. How were there so many monsters? Victoria noted that even with her Chosen One powers, archangel grace, and coffee, pulling all-nighters was not the same as when she was in college. She couldn't focus and was pretty sure she'd read about the Chupacabra at least five times without ever figuring out how to kill it. She would take breaks between the encyclopedia of Monsters (yes there was such a thing), a rather comprehensive guide to Greek mythology, and a chemistry textbook she was using as a reference to try and figure out a way to make her exploding ammo more of an implosion. Her dry-cleaning lady was pissed last time.

Castiel came in around four am and narrowed his eyes at her as he lowered his head.

"Victoria?"

She met his deep blue gaze. "Hello Castiel."

He took the seat opposite her.

"Dean told me of your dreams."

All their codependency knew no bounds.

Victoria nodded. "They are just dreams, Castiel, I've had similar ones before."

Not really. But she was a human, who was a hunter, and damn it, she was fine. Or she was gonna be. She pulled a gummy worm out of the bag and ripped it between her teeth. The sour crystals lingered on her lips and as she licked the sour away her heart stilled at the slight taste of metal.

"Your lip is bleeding."

Oh thank God, she must have bit it. The grace flew to her aid, sealing the wound. That grace. Her hand went to her chest. Was the dreaming coming from that grace? Of course it was. Nothing else made sense.

"Ezekiel said you had a way to remove the grace."

Castiel tipped his head. "Is it bothering you?"

"It itches." As well as giving her dreams where she questioned her very existence, but she went with itching.

"I can attempt to remove it. I was successful in removing the grace Sam still possessed when he was no longer Gadreel's vessel."

Victoria nodded. "Thank you."

Victoria sat up as straight as possible while Castiel inserted the needle into her neck, where grace can usually be extracted. He frowned as he only pulled out blood.

"I do not understand, this was effective with Sam."

"It stays here." She pointed to her chest.

Cas appeared hesitant. "I can attempt that Victoria, however, that is not typically how this is done."

"Typically?"

Castiel shrugged, a very human motion that amused Victoria, ever so slightly. "According to the instructions."

That made her full-on smile.

"You would be an instruction type Angel."

Cas smiled out the side of his mouth and narrowed his eyes in mock seriousness. "Not always."

He went to clean the oversized hypodermic and came back apprehensive. "I will heal you if this does not go correctly."

Victoria nodded. "You better." A slight smile played on her lips, but it was mixed with the tiniest bit of fear.

Cas stood directly in front of her and inserted the needle straight into her chest. Before he could try and extract the grace, the syringe began to shake, out of his control. He quickly moved to the side as the hypodermic rapidly removed itself from her chest, spun in midair and imploded in a flash of a bright blue light.

"What the hell was that?" Dean exclaimed, coming into the room with a cup of coffee and his free hand in the pocket of his robe. A man who had seen so much stuff in his life that an imploding blue ball of light was not even worth an aggressive stance.

"Okay, I can see where you're coming from..." Dean began, taking a deep sip from his mug, "But Zeke told you the stuff wasn't evil."

"These aren't nightmares Dean." Victoria bit her bottom lip and looked into her friend's green eyes. Eyes that projected kindness but could also be hard, but usually not with her, especially lately. Eyes that had seen far too much and been loved way too little.

"Then what are they?"

Victoria sat back in her seat, how was she going to explain this? "They are what might have been?"

Dean just shrugged, not in a dismissive or unsure way, but in a questioning one.

"I don't need poetry, I need you to talk."

"Hypocritical much?"

Dean's look was a warning. He had seen firsthand, once with his brother and once with Cas, what dreaming of the Devil could do. "This isn't about shoving stuff down Tor, you were trying to extract grace Zeke said you needed."

"It is just beneficial, I don't need it."

"Pretty much saved your Chosen One ass with the tribrid didn't it?"

She glowered at him.

"Dean." Cas's voice was a warning all its own.

"No, Cas. Look, Tor here, can take whatever I dish out, and more. She's family, you and Sam don't have to protect her from me, you know that, man. And she gives as good as she gets."

"Yes, Dean. It saved my ass."

Cas chuckled. Dean grinned.

"But…" Victoria ripped a gummy worm between her teeth, receiving a strange, almost quizzical look from Dean, "I think it is causing the dreams. Or presentations of an alternate reality, whatever it is."

Alternate reality. Dean took another swig of coffee. Victoria had never had too much of a sweet tooth that he noticed before. I mean, the girl baked, and ate that, but the whole candy thing was new. Too new. He looked at her intensely, eyes narrowed. Gabriel? Naw. Dean looked again. Naw. Naw?

"What's with the candy?"

"What?"

"I've never seen you eat candy like that before."

"It's a replacement."

Replacement? What for? The realization dawned on Dean and he felt like the world's biggest ass. Of course, she would need a replacement for the alcohol right now. Who wouldn't?

Dean used one of his winning strategies, deflection. "Okay, so Zeke says the grace is good, you keep it. And we'll work through the dreams."

She looked down at her hands. "He tells me this is the dream." Her blue eyes met green once more.

Dream Devil, man, bag of dicks. "You know better Tor."

"Perhaps if you attempted to ground yourself in the dream, you would realize it is simply an illusion?"

Victoria shook her head at the angel. "I feel everything there just as much as I feel it here, I do use grounding techniques, yes, but only to quell the terror." She scratched at her forehead and ran her hand down her face.

Dean scratched the back of his neck and shared a look with Cas. "What about dream walking?"

"Are you suggesting I visit others' dreams?"

"I'm suggesting Cas visit yours."

She shuddered. "No." The word came out harsh, pained.

Cas furrowed his brow.

"He would kill you. My Guardian is laying dead in front of his throne, eyes charred. A vessel never to return to his infant daughter." She said way more than she intended to, the scene filling her eyes and spilling out of her mouth. She coughed quickly, "It's just a dream."

Neither one of them was buying it. But they were also both masters of emotional suppression, so they let it go. For now.

Sam wondered in, hair out of place, gray t-shirt and flannel pajama pants. He kissed Victoria lightly on the cheek. He stumbled to the fridge and managed to pour a glass of orange juice. He realized everyone was staring at him when he sat down.

"What?"

"You look even worse than usual man, and I swear the hair, long as Tor's."

"Worse than usual?"

"When you wake up, and you're the frickin' morning one." Dean got up to get his breakfast casserole out of the oven. He smiled and clicked his tongue, admiring his work. "Oh yeah, this baby is gonna be delicious."

"I didn't sleep well." He smiled sadly at Victoria. Sam knew she stayed up all night to avoid the dreams. He had attempted similar things in the past, and knew eventually whatever was going to happen originally, did. He wanted to know what the dreams were about, hunters were used to nightmares, but whatever this was, was not that. But he wouldn't press, he very rarely ever did.

"You were out of it for quite awhile that time."

Damn it. She fell asleep at the table reading and no one woke her up. Son of a bitch! She looked around on the floor.

"You cleaned up."

"Yeah, dead vessels can get gross." His face scrunched up in disgust.

Her eyes went to the child in the cradle. "She's sleeping." He put his finger to his lips.

Victoria walked over to the cradle and gently picked up the child, her only saving grace in this nightmare. She went and sat down in her throne, not finding any other furniture in the room. The child's breathing was soothing, her body warm against her mother's chest.

"Why am I wearing this dress?" The clothing was medieval, with a low neckline and bell sleeves.

Lucifer shrugged Sam's broad shoulders. "I have a fetish." Victoria felt herself tremor.

"You can't read my thoughts."

"Nope." That chalice was still full with blood, or refilled, Victoria didn't want to know.

"But last night, you knew what I was doing, in my real life." She accentuated the word "real".

Lucifer looked at her with a shocked expression on Sam's face, it was almost comical. "The field thing? Oh babe, I was joking. How pathetic!"

Victoria's eyes developed a sheen and she focused on the child's breathing.

"Now, you have got to admit that you and Sam, on a date, in a field? Yeah, hon, that's not your life."

"It is." Her resolution was apparent in the jut of her chin and rise of her breast.

"Yeah, it's not. And what, were you training with Dean too in a whole Rocky sequence?"

Her expression was all he needed. "Oh babe! You've got to reign that in. I don't mind the occasional slip of yours back into that dreamland, but don't make it so corny." He rolled Sam's eyes.

"Just because it has good points, doesn't mean it's not real." He detected the tiniest bit of doubt in her voice. And like the saying goes, the devil is in the details. And that little detail? He could work with.

With an eyebrow raised to her, and lips red with blood, he began to water the seed he already planted, a seed he knew took when she fought sleep. "Okay, yeah, sure. But just how good do you think you can have it Victoria Morningstar?"

"Do not call me that."

"It's your name, my Queen."

"My name is Victoria Doyle. I live in a bunker with two hunters, an angel, my nephew, and Mary Winchester. And at times, we are content." She couldn't make herself say happy. But that moment with Sam last night? That was happiness wasn't it? It felt like it could be.

"Right, cause that sounds like the Winchesters doesn't it?" His eyes flashed red for just a moment. "Think, Victoria, go through those memories of yours, have they ever been content? That world, where you fight monsters and always win? That world is your illusion, a haven you created for yourself. Come fully to me, my bride, and we will rule the world."

He turned her head to his and kissed her on the lips before she could move or protest. He was much stronger in this vessel, and what appeared to be an endless supply of blood.

Victoria woke up to no one around her, which was strange. She assumed Sam would have carried her to bed. But he was probably afraid of waking her, knowing she would not go back to sleep. The grace swirled around her chest and she knew she had to get it out, and if that extraction tool didn't work, she knew a weapon that would.

They had hidden it well, fearing it wouldn't be truly safe, not even in the bunker. It was one of a kind, probably the last one on this plane. Lucifer brought it with him from apocalypse world and left it when Jack ended his life.

Victoria gave a sideways glance to the glass jar housing her evil, trying to shake away the calling. Damn, that stuff was creepy. Victoria breathed, steadying herself and crawled beneath one of the tables in the basement to a cinder block. She dug into either side of the cinder block with her nails, breaking several in the process. She silently cursed at the blood stains that would leave.

The cinder block had been dug out, the archangel blade resting at its bottom. Victoria carefully removed it, replacing the block, mentally reminding herself to clean the wall when this was over, when she replaced the blade. Blood draws attention and their perfect hiding spot would no longer be perfect, but rather a calling card. 'Creepy angel killing blade in here, right here, where the blood is.' She shuffled around and found a glass vial as well, knowing the grace could be useful later.

Victoria crawled up the stairs as quietly as she could, knowing all the occupants of the bunker were light sleepers. Cas was usually in his room watching Netflix at this time of night, so he would probably be the last one to hear her. She climbed up the stairs and exited the bunker, sitting down in the grass that covered the bunker's front door.

Dean's line bobbed in and out of the water, the reel being lazily turned by the experienced hunter.

"Hey Cas, you know you're like two doors down from me man."

"I am not Castiel."

Dean whipped around and stood, dropping his pole, and his beer. His hunter reflexes were honed, perfected, even in a sleepy, lakeside dream.

"Zeke?!"

The angel looked scared, Dean almost able to see the unsettled and swiftly moving grace underneath the angel's illusioned vessel.

"Victoria's soul cried out to my grace. My vessel is unavailable, take Castiel and go outside."

Ezekiel touched Dean's forehead.

Dean threw on his robe, grabbed Cas from in front of his TV and ran outside.

Victoria Doyle was not anything if she wasn't logical. She knew this blade had the real potential to kill her, she was not acting on a level of self-destruction. She did not want to die. She simply did not want to live with those dreams. Despite what she was told, the grace, its memory, flowing inside of her must be the cause of those dreams. It was rational, it made sense. It was a problem that needed a solution.

Victoria unbuttoned her shirt slightly and pressed the tip of the blade to her chest with her right hand. It was an uncomfortable position and she hoped she wouldn't need much pressure to extract the grace. With the glass vial in her left, she made a straight cut about four inches down with no result, just blood. Victoria sighed.

With a shaking hand, because damn, this hurt, she started her task again, only deeper this time. The blade stung, as if it touched the grace and burned it, but it could not be reached. Knowing anatomy fairly well from her biology classes she knew she could go about an inch deeper before she reached her heart. From what Crowley said about Chosen Ones, a puncture to the heart with an archangel blade would probably not be something she could recover from, grace or not.

Her light blue shirt was drenched in her own blood, and she knew it was not salvageable, amazing dry-cleaning woman or not. The grace was fluttering, burning, and irritated. It sealed Victoria's injuries with righteous anger. Between the itching and the burning, Victoria's patience was growing thin.

She stabbed the blade a quarter inch further than the time previous, drawing more pain and more blood. She hissed, fury rising within her at the futile attempts. Eyes burning, hand shaking, and mind determined, Victoria thrust the blade in between her breasts and dragged down hard. She felt it nick her heart, and just as quickly as the agonizing pain began, it subsided. She felt a coolness where there was once fire, a splash of water to control the flames.

"Castiel." The angel's name was hissed, purple eyes focused on the seraph's glowing blue ones.

"Yes." He took the blade from her hand.

She let go willingly, not to relinquish power, but to not hurt him. She wouldn't fight with the Angel. She closed her eyes, and they reopened, blue once more.

Dean plopped in the grass beside her, now that the danger was over. He pulled her into his lap and just held her there. He closed his eyes, only to see her angel.

Worry clouded every feature. His hands shook and the Guardian could not stand still. "Holden is watching his daughter, and David has a shift at the hospital. May I…" He couldn't ask. He knew their history and couldn't bear to ask.

Dean looked at him. This was the exact opposite of what he had been taught, the exact opposite of what his gut told him to do. But this angel was hurting. The human he loved just almost cut her heart out because of Dream Devil and he couldn't protect her.

Dean licked his lips and shifted his weight from one foot to another, arms crossed. "Both of us man, up front. And if you renege…"

"Victoria can exorcise me. Or kill me. I do not care."

Damn he was hurting.

"I know you are weary, Dean Winchester. I know what Lucifer did to your brother, and Castiel, and what Michael wanted to do to you. What Gadreel did. I assure you; I am not like my brothers. I will never forget this favor."

Against his better judgment, and without talking to Sammy, Dean said, "Yes."

Dean's eyes glowed blue, causing Castiel to shuffle away and hold up the archangel blade.

"Relax Cas, it's just Zeke."

That did not seem to steel the angel. Team Free Will often fought against possession, and after his recent bout with Lucifer, Cas was not all that comfortable seeing any angel possess his best friend.

The angel currently using Dean Winchester's body brushed back Victoria's hair so he could see her face.

"Dean?" She muttered.

"Victoria."

Her eyes opened widely. "Ezekiel."

He sniffed out a laugh, grace calming Dean's body. "Why did you do that?" He put his hand on her chest, their graces communing, comforting the Chosen One. She looked into green eyes that were not his, but ones she found comfort in, nonetheless.

"The grace is causing me to have misgivings, a difficulty in distinguishing between fact and fiction. It is, for lack of a better term, driving me insane."

"That is not the grace, Victoria." He put his forehead against hers. "That is the trauma."

She snorted. "Bull."

His expression pained, her inability to cope, to accept help, to even admit the fact she needed help, her belief in a supernatural solution over a mental one, caused his millennial old being to feel even older. He felt like Atlas, and Victoria Doyle was his world.

"I'm a hunter Ezekiel. We are trauma." She scooted away from him.

The pain in the eyes that were not his own intensified, and she knew, without listening, that he was telling the truth.

"I am going insane?" her breath was shaky, voice trembling. Hand to her heart, dried blood flaking off, she took short breaths. Clutching the grass beside her she forced deep breaths in and out. His hand reached out to hers.

"Not insane, no. You will work through this, as many other women, and men, have done."

"I'm like this because I was friggin' kidnapped?" She scoffed, breaths shortening once more.

"Even if you were, that would be okay, but you know, as well as I, as well as Castiel, Dean, Sam, and Mary, that it was and is so much more than that."

She did know. She closed her eyes and nodded.

Ezekiel kissed her on the forehead before addressing his host.

"Thank you, Dean."

Dean shook his head to clear it as Ezekiel went back to Heaven.

"Dean?"

"All me buddy."

Cas allowed a look of relief to wash over his features.

Victoria looked to Dean. "He cannot know."

"Sam?' Dean's brow furrowed, his eyes growing serious. "Tor…"

"Dean, think about it, I'm going back and forth between two different versions of reality. In one of those, Sam is the Devil. He accepted Lucifer because Lucifer told Sam that if he did then he would not…" Victoria steeled herself, "Push me too far."

Dean's nostrils flared as he breathed in harshly. He wanted to punch something. Dream Devil was such a dick.

"We have to think of something else to tell him, some other type of horror that won't make him feel guilty."

Cas's eyes narrowed. "Victoria, Sam suffered similar delusions regarding Lucifer."

Victoria looked at him quizzically.

"Yeah, when his soul got back from the cage match." Dean responded quickly so Cas wouldn't blame himself for the whole damn thing. Some of which was definitely his fault.

"What happened?"

"He almost died."

Dean glared daggers at the Angel. Cas took no notice of him.

"However, I was able to lift his burden from him, take on his pain, perhaps I could do the same with you."

Dean had a look of pure fear. No way his best friend was going through that again. No way any of them were going through that again.

"Cas." A warning, a tone the Angel knew well over the years.

Victoria sat up, rigid and straight. "No." She licked her lips and stared at her hands. "For one, it would be impossible. I am not simply human. Two, no way in hell are you taking this from me."

A slight smile played at the corner of Dean's mouth, a mixture of pride and affection.

"I will be fine."

"Yeah, Castiel, well, so will I. I didn't go through what Sam did, my soul wasn't used as a play toy for Satan." She cringed at the thought, hand going to her chest. "Yes, I was kidnapped, and violated, and yes, I will suffer with that trauma. But I'll be okay. You mean far too much to me Angel, this isn't on you. What you did for Sam had to be done, but this is completely different. And this time, you are not responsible. Got it?"

Castiel nodded, his eyes still unsure.

She stood up; the men did the same.

"Tor?"

She turned to the eldest Winchester, "Hum?"

"We're gonna go on a trip."