Thank you so much VegasGranny and Ncsupnatfan for pre-reading. This chapter is un-beta'd, so I apologize for all remaining mistakes.

Thank you all for reading and reviewing the last chapter. I didn't expect so many of you as it's such a tough plot. Please, if you do enjoy it, get in touch. The sequel is not yet complete and your reviews encouraged me to open it up again.

Chapter Two

Dean staggered over to Nick who was crumpled on the floor, gasping and wheezing in a way that made Dean's own breaths hard to take. He dropped down beside him. "Hey, take a breath, Nicky. You're okay."

Nick nodded and seemed to be trying, but his abused throat was constricting his breaths in a worrying way.

"Cas," Dean called, placing a hand on his brother's shoulder. "A little help."

Castiel appeared beside them and touched his fingers to Nick's throat. There was a rush of light, and then Nick sucked in a lungful of air and blew it out in a relieved sigh, "Thanks, Cas," he muttered.

"You okay, man?" Dean checked, and when Nick nodded, he got to his feet and hauled Nick up by one hand and steadied him.

"Jack," Castiel said, his voice tentative.

Dean turned to Jack, who was leaning against a table and holding a hand to his throat. He looked stunned, and Dean realized he'd overlooked what Jack had gone through in his concern for his brother. Nick wasn't the only one that had been hurt.

Nick went to Jack and squeezed his shoulder. "Hey, buddy, you're okay, right?"

Jack lowered his hand from his throat, his eyes woeful and his voice disbelieving. "He took my grace."

Dean glanced at Castiel. "Did he get all of it? Is he human now like you were?"

Castiel narrowed his eyes and peered at Jack, concern furrowing his brow. "No. There is a trace left. It will replenish itself over time."

"How much time?" Jack asked desperately.

Castiel opened his mouth to answer, sighed, then shook his head. "I don't know. But it will."

Jack looked stricken. "But I need it now! Lucifer is out there, and Michael escaped. How can I kill them without my grace?"

Nick squeezed his shoulder and said, "It's okay, Jack. We've beaten Lucifer once, and we took Michael down in this world, and we didn't have superpowers. We did it together, and we can do it again, got it?"

Dean swallowed hard. They had beaten Lucifer before, and Michael, but that had come at a cost he would never be willing to pay again. He wasn't losing Nick for this. Never again.

Nick glanced at him, seemed to see Dean's turmoil, and he smiled slightly in his annoying I'm-can-and-will-do-this-Dean way that usually meant he was about to throw himself into the fire.

Instead of reassuring Dean as Nick obviously intended it to do, it made bile rise in his throat, and his voice came harshly. "We're not doing that again, Nick. No way."

Castiel and Jack looked between them, Jack confused and Castiel suspicious. Jack had never heard the full story of how they'd beaten Lucifer last time. Nick hadn't offered up the story, so Dean had figured he didn't want Jack to know. He'd had respected that and kept his own silence.

Besides, they'd had bigger issues to deal with.

"No, Nick," Castiel said, his voice firm. "Even if any of us were willing to let you do that again, it would never work. Lucifer has a vessel that will sustain him, thanks to Crowley's machinations, so he won't need you, and we cannot trick either of them in. It would take more than that to defeat them."

Nick looked understandably relieved, but there was also a trace of guilt in his blue eyes. Dean was glad to see more relief than guilt as it meant Nick was thinking smart instead of plotting to throw himself into the Pit again behind their backs. Given his history, Dean wouldn't put it past him to try. Nick was stubborn as all hell and loved intensely. If he thought it would save his family, he would throw himself into the Pit without hesitation. Dean would do the same if it came down to it, but he would exhaust other options first. Nick was more impetuous.

"We'll find another way," Castiel finished.

Though Nick nodded, he looked worried. Jack looked horrified still. Dean guessed he was struggling with the loss of his grace coupled with the betrayal of his father. He'd been coming around to Lucifer before it happened, seeing him as the good guy, and it had cost him.

Dean had felt annoyed that Jack had allowed himself to be fooled after all they'd told him about Lucifer, but he knew blood had a big draw. Jack could probably relate to Lucifer on a level of power, if nothing else.

"We should call Mom," Nick said. "She and Bobby need to know what's happening. They're probably going out of their heads."

Dean nodded and withdrew his phone from his pocket. He hit the speed dial assigned to Mary and raised it to his ear. It was answered after only a moment, and Dean was unsurprised to hear an echo in the call instead of the sound of an engine. They'd told her and Bobby to get Maggie out of there, wanting her safe, but they'd not gone far; from the echo, he figured she was in the garage. He probably should have been pleased that she'd listened enough to get away as far as she had.

"Dean! Are you okay? Is Nick?"

"We're fine," Dean said, figuring she didn't need to know about Nick's near-strangulation at Lucifer's hands. The evidence of it, Nick's strained breaths and the fingerprints around his throat, were gone thanks to Castiel.

"What about Michael?" she asked.

"He got away," Dean said, glancing at the body of Michael's vessel on the floor. He had little sympathy for the man he'd been before Michael took him over—even though he knew the pressure that would have been put on him to give consent—since it was that man who had given Michael a vessel to destroy a world with.

Mary cursed.

"Lucifer, too," he said. "Turns out the change of heart was a load of crap. He was a dick all along. He took… He hurt Jack."

"Is he okay? Wait. I'm coming."

The call clicked off, and Dean tucked his phone back in his pocket.

"Mom's on her way?" Nick guessed.

Dean nodded. "Let's go. I need a drink."

He crossed the library and went to the cabinet where they stored the decanters of whiskey and glasses. He poured one apiece for himself, Nick, and Mary, then hesitated before pouring one for Jack. He figured the kid could use a medicinal hit.

He took two of the glasses and carried them to the table, and Nick brought the others as Mary rushed into the room, followed by Bobby and a nervous-looking Maggie. Mary's eyes moved between them all, seeking visual reassurance, then she asked, "Are you really okay?"

Nick and Dean nodded, but Jack didn't answer. His hand went back to his throat as if feeling for the wound that Lucifer had created to steal his grace.

Bobby looked at the body of Michael's vessel, his jaw tight with tension. "What happened? How did he get away?"

He sounded angry, which Dean understood but wished he'd toned it down as Jack flinched and looked into his eyes as he said, "I couldn't stop him. Lucifer took my grace."

Mary gasped. "Your grace?"

Jack nodded dolefully.

"How?" Bobby asked. "You're powerful enough to knock him on his ass."

"It doesn't matter how," Nick said, glaring at Bobby. "It's done. What we need to work out is what we're going to do next. Lucifer didn't just take Jack's grace away from him—he took it in himself. He has Jack's power now."

"Well, ain't that just perfect," Bobby said bitterly. "We've got two archangels to take down, and one of them is even more turbo-charged than before."

Nick pushed a glass into his hand and said, "Have a drink, Bobby." The message behind it was as clear as if he'd spoken it aloud—have a drink and shut up.

Castiel pulled out a chair and guided Jack into it. Dean thought it was probably a good idea as Jack was unsteady and pale still.

Nick gave Jack a glass and then sat down beside him.

They all joined them, Maggie, too, though she seemed a little detached from what was happening around her. Bobby took his seat last, pulling the chair far back as if wanting to separate himself from them. Nick shot him an annoyed look. Nick had a temper, and Bobby was pushing his buttons by making Jack uncomfortable.

"Lucifer might be turbocharged, but there was something wrong with him," Castiel said. "Did you notice?"

"Yes," Nick said. "It was like he was tripping out. He was confused after he took Jack's grace; it was like he couldn't work out what was happening. He told me to 'take it back.' And when he healed Jack, it was like he didn't even know what he was doing: it was automatic." Nick glanced at Jack again, who was staring into the depths of his glass. "And he didn't take it all. He stopped, healed him."

Dean had been consumed with what was happening around him, Lucifer's fingers around his brother's neck, but now he analyzed the scene and saw what they meant. Lucifer was his arrogant and cruel self at first, but after he took Jack's grace in, it seemed to do something to him. And he had stopped. He could have had it all, taken all of Jack's power, but he hadn't.

"Do you think he meant take the grace back, Cas?" Nick asked. "Like it was doing something to him."

Dean's eyes snapped to Castiel, a flicker of hope in his chest.

Castiel's brow furrowed. "Perhaps. Grace is the true essence of an angel. It's not technically the same as a soul is to a human, as we retain almost everything of ourselves if it's gone, but… When I took Theo's grace, I also took some of his memories and… feelings. I felt things a little differently to the way I did when I had my own. It was the same after Crowley gave me Adina's." He fell silent for a moment and then said, "They were both tainted angels. Jack is perhaps the purest being any of us have ever known."

Jack shifted uncomfortably, and Nick nudged his arm and said, "He's not wrong, kid."

"I imagine feeling that kind of purity would be a shock for an angel with the kind of darkness Lucifer possesses. He could be struggling with that," Castiel went on.

"What does that mean for us, though?" Bobby asked. "Do we have a crazy as well as turbo-charged archangel to deal with?"

"I don't know," Castiel admitted. "We could hope that the level of purity will positively affect him, that his own darkness would be tempered by it, or…"

"Or he could just carry on being an asshole but with more power," Dean said.

Castiel bowed his head, his brow furrowed. "Yes."

"I think that's more likely," Nick said. "He didn't seem all that positive when he was choking me or throwing you and Dean around."

Mary's eyes widened. "He choked you!"

Nick held up a hand. "I'm fine, Mom. Cas healed me. My point is that he's not showing any good changes so far. I think we've got to accept that he's going to be as cruel as he always was."

Dean thought Nick was probably right. It would have been good to have a more mellow Lucifer to take down, though. It definitely would have made things easier. As it was, Dean felt lost. Two archangels, one of them charged up with Nephilim grace and possibly crazy, the other that had already destroyed one world, were going to take a lot of work to stop. They'd not faced odds like it since Amara, and he doubted God was going to sweep in and help them out this time.

"What about the archangel blade?" Bobby asked. "We've still got that."

"We can't kill either of them with it," Nick said. "It needs another archangel behind it to work. The only way we can kill them with a weapon is if we get one of their own blades off them, and I don't see that happening."

Dean nodded his agreement. When he'd been egging Jack on, he'd been only hoping they could hurt Lucifer, drive him away. It had worked, but it wasn't likely it would again. He had a feeling Lucifer—and Michael, too—were more likely to smite them instead of ducking and running next time.

"Lucifer did flee the blade though," Castiel pointed out.

Nick shrugged. "He was already bleeding and freaking out. He'll already be healed by now, and maybe he'll handle the grace confusion once he's had a chance to get used to it. It's not going to work again."

"Then what the hell do we do?" Bobby growled.

"We stop, think, and research," Castiel said. "Jack, you should rest. I will try to reach Naomi on angel radio. If I can persuade her to open the gates and see me, I can find out if she knows more about the archangels than we do. She was in the minds of all angels at some point, and she served Michael directly. There might be something that can help us.

Bobby glowered down at the tabletop and then said, "Sure, we'll hope for that. I'll get Maggie back into town. The rest of my people need to be filled in on what's happening. I'm gonna have to tell them Michael is on the loose again."

"He's loose, but he doesn't have a vessel," Nick pointed out. "It will be hard for him to find another. We've got time on him anyway. It's Lucifer who's the biggest threat."

"I'll be sure to tell them that, too," Bobby said. "That'll cheer them all right up. It's not like any of them were banking on the fact Lucifer seemed to turn over a new leaf or anything." Before any of them could rebuke him or argue, he'd scraped back his chair and got to his feet. "Come on, Maggie."

Maggie stood, and they both walked from the room together, eyes falling on the body quickly before moving on.

"We need to deal with him," Nick said, thumbing at the vessel's body. "He's dead, and I don't know what Michael is capable of in this world, if his power is any different, but I wouldn't put it past him to find a way to bring him back and use him again."

"We'll salt and burn him," Dean said.

Nick raised an eyebrow at him. "That might not stop him. It didn't ours."

Dean looked away as he remembered. They'd salted and burned Adam, but Michael had found a way to resurrect him to be a vessel. They were going to have to get creative this time. Maybe storing the ashes in a warded box. That would only inconvenience Michael, though.

Sooner or later—probably sooner—they were going to need to deal with both archangels, and their most powerful weapon, Jack, wasn't going to be able to help.

Dean had a sneaking suspicion that made the whiskey glass in his hand tremor that it was going to cost something big to deal with them this time. Something he wasn't willing to lose.

However it happened, he wasn't giving up his family for it. Nick and Mary, Castiel and Jack, were the ones that mattered most to him. He wasn't letting any of them go for this fight.

He'd done that before, allowed Nick to sacrifice himself, and he never would again.

So… If you're reading this, you were intrigued enough by the first chapter to keep going. Thank you so much. I'm so glad you're here, as writing into a void isn't nearly as much fun as sharing a story. I appreciate you all giving it a chance and hope I can keep you with me for the entirety.

What did you think of their theories for 'Lucifer'? How was it to read Nick in Sam's place?

Until next time…

Clowns or Midgets xxx