Ch 49
The Colt didn't kill Lucifer.
But it did knock him on his ass for a good thirty seconds. Thirty glorious seconds in which Dean and Sam let a fireball of hope flare in their bellies. Then Lucifer coughed, shook it off and stood up. "Where did you get that?" he demanded. Dean stood shellshocked in front of him. He had been so damn sure this was it. He had his shot. He took it. Castiel was MIA. The last vision he had of River were her scared blue eyes. Less than fifty feet away from him. But she might as well have been on the opposite end of the Universe with a pack of Hell Hounds between them. Jo and Ellen were dead. Had died to give him and his brother a chance.
This chance. The chance to shoot the Devil dead. And it hadn't fucking worked. Before Dean could respond to the Devil's rhetorical question Lucifer swung his arm connecting the side of his head sending Dean a dozen feet into the air. Luckily a tree sprang out of the darkness and stopped Dean from flying into the soft earth of the field beyond. He fell to the ground in a crumpled head leaving Sam to face the Devil alone.
Lucifer smiled down at Dean's still form before turning his decaying face back to the younger Winchester. "Now, where were we?" Sam stared at the Archangel in front of him, fear coursing through him at an octave he had yet to experience. "Don't look at me like that, Sam. That was a great shot. Really. Your brother has guts of steel…but there are five things in all of creation that gun can't kill. And I just happen to be on of them." Satan smiled sheepishly picking up a discarded shovel near a pile of dirt. "If you give me just a minute…I got one thing I need to finish." He turned away from Sam and began shoveling the dirt onto a huge mound behind him. Sam took the opportunity to run to his brother. Dean had a strong, steady heartbeat but was down for the count for the time being. "Sammy, would it be to much to ask for you to just say 'yes' right here, right now. Put all this unpleasantness behind us?" Lucifer called to him. The Devil lazily leaned on his shovel looking down at the brothers.
"Never! It is never going to happen!" Sam yelled.
Satan sighed and returned to his dirt, "Oh I don't know Sam. I think it is. And I think it's gonna happen within six months…in Detroit."
Sam ran a hand over his face, took a deep breath and looked again at the dozens of shadowed men standing silently watching Lucifer. "What did you do to this town?"
"I was very generous with this town, Sammy. One demon for every able bodied man," Lucifer called over his shoulder. His shovel never slowing, the mound of dirt slowly decreasing.
A sick feeling of realization washed over Sam. The meaning behind the huge pile of earth and the missing towns people. "And the rest of them?" He demanded.
Lucifer stopped his shoveling and made a show of cracking his back, "Down there, Sammy. The women and children first of course. It's awful I know. But these Horsemen are so demanding. And I guess when you're Death you get to call your own shots…to an extent." Dean groaned and tried to sit up. Sam leaned down to his brother and pulled him unsteadily to his feet. Satan had turned back to the mass grave he had finished covering and began chanting in Enochian. A great sigh drifted up from the packed Earth, as if a few hundred people had just exhaled their last breath all at once. "Now for the final part. Repeat after me: I willingly give my life, my essence, my soul to you Death," Lucifer said looking out at the dozens of black eyes staring back at him. As one, the gathered demons repeated the final part of the spell. Then as one they died. Brilliant flashes of orange sparks erupting as Lucifer killed each of them. Dean and Sam stood dazed. Lucifer brushed the dirt of his hands and turned towards the brothers shrugging his shoulders, "What? They're just demons." His lips curled in disgust as he spat out the word. Thunderous groaning echoed across the empty field as the very Earth shuddered. Lucifer smiled triumphantly looking again towards the mass grave, the dirt within crumbling and churning as if a giant sinkhole was opening up. The bodies of the sacrificed residents being pulled down to the Pit; more sighs, high pitched wails and sobs rose up from the swirling whirlpool of earth. The brothers took a step back as the ground under them shook and hit a wall of trench coat. Castiel placed a hand on each of their shoulders and suddenly the brothers found themselves in the Impala.
Dean started the car. Tires screeching as he pushed his Baby to her limits. "Cas you gotta find River, man. She's still here somewhere-" Dean said looking into the Angels cool cornflower blue eyes in the rearview mirror. The muscles in Castiel's jaw tightened and he was gone. "Shit! Shit!" Dean yelled slamming his hand into the steering wheel. Carthage quickly disappearing from view as the Impala tore away from the doomed town.
"He'll find her, Dean." Sam said quietly.
"And then what, huh? We're back to rounding up the last two Decoder rings from Death and Pestilence…fuck. That's really our only god damn option isn't it?" Dean muttered shaking his head. He pressed his foot down harder on the accelerator and Baby lurched forward with another burst of speed.
"Or God." Sam countered.
Dean snorted, "God. Where the hell was God while Lucifer slaughtered that town? Where was God while Jo bled to death and Ellen blew herself up?"
Castiel reappeared in the backseat, "River is not in Carthage."
"What? Is she dead, Cas? The Hellhounds…they had to have left something," Dean swallowed thickly.
The Angel shook his head, "Dean she is not in Carthage. I found some of her blood, a very small amount, and signs of a struggle in a building in the middle of town. But she is gone."
"No! No! God damn it. Then she ran. She made it out of town."
"I checked everywhere in a fifty mile radius. She's not here Dean."
"Then find her!" he yelled back.
Castiel cast his eyes down, "Dean, I can't."
"What do you mean you can't!"
"Dean," Sam started quietly. "Her warding. She's invisible to all Angels. Just like us. That means Cas, too."
A vein throbbed in Dean's neck. He clenched the steering wheel hard enough for his knuckles to pop. The tidal wave of anger and frustration crested and he lost control. Letting out a guttural yell he slammed his fist into Baby's roof. The self-loathing, the feeling of absolute failure, the lack of control over his own piece of shit life were suffocating. He had one damn job: to kill Lucifer and he failed. Now Ellen and Jo were dead, River was probably dead. And now he and his brother were exactly back to square one; sitting ducks waiting for one or both of them to be scooped up by an Archangel. "Harob has her." He said when he was finally able to speak again.
"How?" Sam asked.
Dean shook his head, "I don't fucking know how but he does. Call Bobby he's gotta find another summoning spell or a way to track the son of a bitch. There has to be something."
"I gotta tell him about Ellen and Jo," Sam said staring at his phone. He didn't know how he was going to tell Bobby Lucifer was still alive, the Harvelles were dead and River might as well be at this point. But somehow he did.
Bobby was silent for several long seconds. "Alright, son. Alright I'll find something…just don't go doin' anything else too stupid for the time bein'."
Just as the first earthquake rocked Carthage, Harob wrapped his burning hands around River and transported them to some new isolated location. As she came to find out Demonic transportation was extremely unpleasant. When they landed Harob dropped her unceremoniously onto her broken ankle. Between the agonizing pain of her fractured bones and the constant dizziness from the concussion he had given her she could do nothing to stop the waves of nausea that rolled through her. She retched up the scant contents left in her stomach onto Harob's shiny leather shoes. The demon screamed something at her in a language she didn't understand and before she could even think to protect herself he had kicked her in the side of the face. And then she floated in darkness.
River struggled back to consciousness. Flashes of grey concrete, chipped white tile, and Levi lying on a metal table streaked across her memory. She tried to open her eyes, the left side of her face throbbing from Harob's kick. The swollen mess of her face and the pounding in the back of her head making it difficult to focus on any one thing. She tried to relax her stiff arms but realized they were stretched painfully high above her head. Her wrists bound with barbed-wire and hung from a metal hook that dangled from the ceiling on a long chain. She looked up at the hook she was trapped on, stared as fat, dark red drops of her blood welled up around the sharp metal thorns digging into her wrists and rolled lazily down her pale arms. Her fingers already felt dull, swollen and useless; every so often a tiny prickling sensation would flare up as some nerve ending fought against gravity and lack of oxygenated blood. They were turning an odd shade of deep maroon that she knew couldn't be a good sign. Her head felt too heavy on her neck and she let it loll forward. She didn't know how long she'd been hanging there unconscious; where ever 'there' was.
Wherever Harob had taken her it was cold, dark and carried sound well. She could hear echoes of dripping water, the faint scurrying of rodent feet, and occasionally a distant a train whistle. River shivered in the damp, cold air. Sometime during her little nap, Harob had stripped her of all her clothes except the black tank top she had worn under her shirt and her 'Wonder Woman' underwear. She tried to shift her weight on her right foot; her left ankle a never ceasing staccato of fiery arrows of pain. She took a deep breath, pushed up on the ball of her right foot and tried to force the knot of barbed-wire over the hook. Her foot slipped on the smatter of blood staining the concrete floor and she landed heavily on her broken ankle. The fresh eruption of agony tore a throat ripping scream from her. The evil little barbs in her wrists dug in further as she wailed causing more drops of blood to rain down. She fought back dry heaves, her stomach rolling dangerously with each burst of pain, tears streamed down her cheeks momentarily blinding her. "Fuck, fuck. Get it the fuck together…breathe…." River chanted to herself, trying to take slow deep breathes shoving down the pain, nausea and panic overloading her senses. She wiped her wet eyes on the inside of her arm, blinking them back into focus and saw Harob standing in front of her smiling wickedly.
"Welcome back," he cooed at her.
"Exorcizamus te-" the spell fell from her lips instantly. Harob clicked his tongue annoyed. A glob of almost congealed blood bobbed out of the hole under his chin then plopped to the ground at her feet. He slapped River across the swollen side of her face and the exorcism spell died on her lips.
"Why don't you stop with the childish mumbling? We both know you can't complete the spell fast enough."
River sniffed and spat a mouth full of blood into Harobs face, "How about you eat a dick? Just go find a big fat juicy dick and eat it mother fucker."
"My, my, my….what to do with you." Harob muttered wiping the blood off his face. He stared at her a moment like a frustrated teacher inspecting an insolent pupil. He suddenly stepped forward, closing the space between them grabbed River under her armpits, lifted her off the hook and dropped her to the hard ground. A torrent of 'pins and needles' shot through her arms as the pressure was released. She tried flexing her swollen, numb fingers and was rewarded with another wave of tingling pain. Before she could get any sensation back into her digits Harob wrapped one burning hand around her broken ankle and dragged her along the cold floor. She screamed and cursed at him as he pulled her carelessly down one long corridor and into a another large open room. This room was lit with hundreds of burning candles. More hooks dangled from the ceiling, a deep trough ran through the middle of the floor and a every few feet were drain holes. Even through the pain and fear threatening to eat her alive River finally realized he had taken her to a slaughterhouse. The tang of dead flesh and old blood wafted up from the disused drains. He dropped her leg and walked away from her. She took several deep breaths taking in her view of the kill room. Levi still lay silent and unmoving on a metal table a few feet away. His face a motley assortment of purple and yellow bruises. His shirt stained with blood and torn down the middle exposing a small patch of salt and pepper chest hair.
"Levi! LEVI!" River screamed. "What did you do to him?"
"What haven't I done to him?" Harob quipped back as he flipped through a large ornately decorated black and gold engraved book. She had a clear view of the gory hole her bullet had blown through the back of the vessels head. He hadn't bothered to try and heal himself or get a new body. "I leave him alone for twenty minutes and he's put himself under some sort of spell. I can't wake the bastard up." He found the page he had been looking for and retrieved River dragging her across the floor towards his book.
"Get your fucking hands off of me!" she yelled fighting and scratching and clawing every painful step.
"You will sign your name here. You will be mine for eternity. You will help me reunite the covens. Then we will destroy Lucifer and I will take my rightful place on the throne of Hell," Harob stated. He had one hand pinned around her upper arm forcing her to stand. With the other hand he held an old fashioned feather quill pen more fitting for Hogwarts then their current surroundings.
"That's your bad guy plan? Really after thousands of fucking years that's the best you got?" A fractured, hysterical laugh bubbled up from Rivers chest and she shook her head. "You've got to be fucking kidding me. I'm not putting my name in that god damn book. Lucifers dead or gonna be soon. We got the Colt back and Dean's gonna shoot your daddy in his fucking face."
"Your plan failed. Your friends are dead." His grip around her arm tightened enough for her to fear he was going to break it too. "Give me your name. You have nothing left to fight for."
"No. Never. Just fucking kill me," she said shaking her head again. He released his grip and she stumbled back landing hard on her ass. Her wrists still bound with barbed-wire. Her ankle an ever-swelling lump of hot pain. But for a split second the cold concrete was soothing on her almost naked body.
Harob let out a deep sigh, "You all break eventually." His hands dropped to his belt, his fingers unclasping the metal and pulling the long black leather strap through the belt loops.
"Don't you fucking touch me," River whispered, a new kind of fear creeping up her spine. One she had experienced before and would die fighting before it happened to her again.
Harob smiled sadly, wrapping the strap of the belt around his hand and letting the metal buckle dangle free. "I would never force myself on you. When this is all over you will give yourself willingly to me. Just like Rene, Danielle, Vivian and all the others I've had during the ages. Until then…" He swung his arm up, the metal buckle making a whistling sound as it flew through the air. River had enough time to try and curl herself into a tight ball, throwing her arms over her head and face before the buckle hit. The first bite of metal had barely registered before there three or four more landed on different parts of her body. She bit her lips until they bled trying to choke back the screams. Harob never tired, the belt being whipped against her again and again. Smacking her arms, her back, thighs, butt, every exposed inch of her body he could get to. She ran out of energy to keep screaming and lay curled in a loose ball crying silently. He finally stopped his assault and she could faintly hear him sliding the belt back into place over the sound of her thundering heart and ragged breaths. "Write your name in my grimoire and I will show you such wondrous things," he said kneeling beside her.
She flinched away from his touch as he wiped a piece of sweaty hair out of her eyes. "Can you do one thing for me first?" she mumbled.
"What do you wish me to do?" Harob asked gently.
River took a shaky breath, "Can you go fuck yourself? I'll seriously consider your offer after you go fuck yourself. I just gotta know you mean business before I damn my eternal soul to hell." Harob ground his teeth and growled. He ripped her off the ground by the tangle of barbed wire around her wrists and slammed her back onto one of the hooks dangling from the ceiling. Fresh rivulets of blood ran down her arms as she gasped against the pain.
"You stay there. And think about your options," Harob hissed at her.
"Then I'll stay here 'till I rot you son of a bitch!" she shouted. His black eyes flashed dangerously in the candle light before he disappeared. It was then that River allowed herself to break down, crying out against the pain her abused body was enduring and fearing that Harob's claim that Dean and the others had failed was true. The chest heaving sobs didn't last long, crying was causing her bruised ribs and back more pain. She took a deep breath, wiped her face the best she could on her bloody arm again and tried to adjust herself on the meat hook she was hanging from. Her eyes drifted back to Levi, the wavering light of the candles making it impossible for her to tell if he was breathing. "Levi! Levi wake the fuck up," she yelled hoarsely. "Please! Let me know you're alive." He didn't move, nothing moved except the candle flames and a rat that had crawled out of the shadows and was edging closer to her dangling toes.
Over the next two days Bobby pulled a dozen or so of his oldest, dustiest books down from his bookshelves to find scrying and summoning spells they had yet to try. So far they had all been useless. Harob had no intent of answering any of their summons. Castiel had been gone for long periods of time, only popping in to let them know where he had searched and that he had found nothing useful. "How 'bout you tell me when you find something helpful, Cas! Like that son of a bitch Crowley!" Dean finally yelled at the Angel.
Castiel stuck his hands in the pockets of his trench coat and stared at his feet. "Dean I may have a lead on Pestilence-"
"Pestilence, Cas? I'm not going after another Horseman right now. We're finding River, god damn it!" he yelled again looking from Castiel to his brother then down to Bobby. Sam ran his hands through his hair. Bobby sat heavily back in his wheelchair and pulled down on his ever-present baseball cap. "She isn't gone. I'm getting her back!"
"Thank you heavenly father, I've finally reached them." A faintly glowing shadow appeared in the center of the barn. The four men whipped around to face the intruder.
"Levi? Is that you?" Bobby asked, pushing his wheelchair closer to the ephemeral figure.
Levi did indeed stand before them, his essence wavering in the slight breeze of the barn. "It is me Bobby Singer. I haven't got much time. I've been traveling through the Veil to reach you. I'm sorry it's taken so long. I'm dying. Will be dead any moment. But River is alive for now. You, Angel, you can take them to her before it's too late." Levi pointed at Castiel. The Angel narrowed his blue eyes. Humans were not usually allowed to go traipsing through the Veil. This human had gifts that were truly uncommon.
"Where is she, Levi?" Dean demanded. Levi said something but the words were lost in the borderlands between the living and dead. The Pow-Wow healer doubled over suddenly one hand grasping at his chest and grunted in pain.
"Dean, he's killing her. You must hurry or we will both be lost." He held out his spectral hand towards Dean. The hunter rushed forward and grabbed for Levi. Their hands connected and Levi sent him a mental image of their location then he was gone leaving nothing behind but a cold breeze.
"Cas I know where they are!" Dean exclaimed turning towards his brother and the Angel.
Castiel touched his fingers to Dean's forehand and commanded, "Show me." The location Levi had given him surged to the front of his consciousness and into Castiel. "We must go now," he said placing a hand on each of the brothers shoulders. They were gone before Bobby could blink.
"Balls," the old hunter muttered angrily into the empty barn.
The first time Harob used the cattle prod on her, River's bladder failed. The demon had found it in some dark corner of the abandoned slaughterhouse and decided to see if he could get it to work. He pressed the cold tips into the soft flesh of her ass and sent her jittering like a spastic marionette as she dangled from the meathook. She choked and seized for several long minutes afterwards before all her muscles relaxed. She was so tired and spent she didn't have the energy to be embarrassed about the warm urine dripping down her legs and ruining her 'Wonder Woman' underwear. "So much unpleasantness and for what? Pride? Spite?"
"Fuck you," River muttered. Her eyes looked behind the demon to her friend laying silently on the metal butchering table.
Harob responded with giving her another few seconds on the receiving end of the electric prod. "Is it him? Are you trying to save him? Or wait for him to wake up and save you?" He said setting the cattle prod down on the table next to Levi.
"Leave him alone," River begged. Harob looked over his shoulder at her. "Leave him alone!" she screamed. The Demon looked down at the pale, sleeping form. He jabbed him with the cattle prod causing Levi's sleeping form to shake and twitch on the table. Levi still did not wake or cry out, he remained as he was before silent, pale and oblivious to the world around him. Harob muttered something under his breath and touched Levi's closed eyes. What ever he had tried hadn't worked Levi remained unconscious. The Demon growled in frustration and slammed his fist into Levi's jaw knocking the sleeping mans head to the side. River could tell from he strange way Levi's jaw now jutted out Harob had just broken it. "Get away from him asshole!"
Harob stalked towards River, reached behind his back and pulled out a viciously curved dagger from the folds of his jacket. "Give me your name or you both die tonight," Harob said pressing the tip of the dagger into her throat.
"No," she answered.
"So be it. He dies first." Harob said turning away from River. Without hesitation he plunged the dagger into Levi's heart. His eyes fluttered open briefly as if in disbelief of what had just happened then her friend was gone.
River screamed, struggling again to get off the hook her wrists were tied to, "Levi! Levi I'm here! I'm so sorry!" Harob left the dagger in Levi's chest and picked up the cattle prod.
Castiel's weakened grace had made it especially exhausting to fly both Sam and Dean to the dark building Levi had given as Harob's location. He staggered and fell to his knees when they landed. The brothers shot wary glances around the dark building. Dean pulled Cas to his feet and asked, "You sure this is the place?" Cas nodded.
A scream echoed across the cement walls, bouncing between rooms making it impossible for them to figure out which direction it had originated. "RIVER!" Dean yelled into the darkness. Another scream followed. He took off into the darkness, the screams growing louder as the Sam and Castiel followed close behind. The last scream ended suddenly as they ran into another large open room, this one lit with hundreds of flickering candles. A young man in an expensive suit stepped away from a pale body suspended from the ceiling. Her arms stretched above her head, her toes barely touching the floor, bright red hair obscuring her bruised face. "RIVER!" Dean yelled again, raising the Colt and taking aim at Harob. The Demon opened his mouth, ready to finally shed his damaged vessel and run. Dean fired the Colt, the bullet hit Harob between the eyes. His mouth snapped shut. His body convulsed twice. Putrid orange light flashing behind his eyes then he dropped dead. Faint whips of sulfuric black smoke drifted from his half open mouth. Dean ran towards River's limp form, "Baby, baby wake up. Come on sweetheart." He ran his hands through her hair, lifting her head. "Sammy! Cas! Help me! She's not breathing!" They ran to Dean's side, Cas lifted her off the hook and laid her gently on the ground. "Cas help her man! Fix her! She isn't breathing!" Dean yelled again, his fingers running along her throat looking for a pulse the way River had shown him.
"Dean, I can't heal her." Castiel told him. "My grace…"
Dean's frightened green eyes searched his brothers face, "She's not gonna die. Help me do something!"
Sam nodded, "Ok. Ok. Uhm….give her a breath through her mouth remember? Like that stupid video she made us watch." Clumsily, uncoordinated and shaking from adrenaline they tried to get her breathing again. Sam's big hands pressing down on her chest to try and get her stubborn heart to beat again, Dean giving her his breaths, Castiel pacing nervously between them.
"Wait! I hear her heart," the Angel suddenly yelled. Sam stopped his compressions so Castiel could hold a hand over her chest. "Yes, yes, she's breathing. Her heart is beating."
"Wake up, Baby. Come on," Dean muttered wiping her dirty hair out of her face. Sam pulled out his phone trying to get through to an emergency operator. He cursed after a few seconds of busy signal and found their location on his GPS.
"Cas, there's a trauma hospital here. Can you get her there?" Sam showed Castiel the map on his phone.
Castiel glanced at the map, "Yes. I will come back for you when I can." He picked River up off the floor and was gone in a great flap of his wings. Half the flickering candles were blown out leaving the brothers alone with the bodies of Levi and the demon.
Authors note: Thank you to LadySunshine6. I know it's taken forever to work your request in but between this chapter and the next hopefully you like it. Thank you to everyone else still reading and following.