Chapter 59

According to the information provided by the now deceased demon Brady they had a little less than 24 hours before Pestilence would be expected at his next location. Dean decided their best option was to lay low for a few hours, get some shut-eye, decompress a bit, then go gank the Horseman. So they headed for the town adjacent to the one Pestilence was supposed to be at trying to avoid triggering any Demonic security alarms. Sam was quiet and pensive for the drive; he even volunteered to ride in the backseat, earbuds in and music turned up effectively blockading any of their questions about what transpired between him and the demon that used to be his friend. River and Dean gave him what little space they could in the cramped quarters of the car.

"I need a new laptop." River sighed setting her duffel bag on the floorboards between her feet remembering she had smashed her trusty computer against Crowley's face.

"I don't really think it's in the budget right now. Just borrow Sam's."

"Budget? That's grown-up talk." She smiled at him. "Besides, Sam won't let me use his laptop anymore."

"What'd you do?" He asked smirking at her.

She glanced over her shoulder at Sam, who was seemingly asleep with his eyes closed. "I messed with his Pornhub settings. I changed all his favorites to Furries and bukaki. "

Dean threw his head back and laughed. "Oh that's good. He's always been into the real classy shit with plots and acting."

"I know. I went through his history. Kenny G music, candle lit dinners. So boring…" River said. Dean looked across the seat at her. Staring at her instead of the road for several long seconds. She'd slipped into their life so easily, fitting in instead of pushing him and his brother apart. She smiled nervously. "What? Sammy started it. He used the last of my shampoo and put the empty bottle back in my bag. So when I called him out on his bullshit the petty bitch put a pair of his smelly ass socks in the bottom of my duffle bag. I had to wash all my clothes three times to get his stink out of them."

"Marry me." Dean said suddenly.

It was River's turn to laugh. "Yeah, ok hot stuff. Just as soon as we stop the Apocalypse."

When they finally found a cheap motel with only one obvious trick being turned in the parking lot they booked a room for a few hours. Dean and River collapsed onto the small bed in an exhausted, fully clothed tangle. After a solid six hours of sleep she successfully untangled herself from Dean's various limbs and snuck into the shower without waking him or Sam, who slept on the couch across the room. The hot water and vanilla scented body wash helped erase the lingering stench of sulfur and rot she felt had followed her from Crowleys cabin. By the time she finished getting dressed in the small, foggy bathroom the sounds of the Winchesters arguing echoed on the other side of the door. "No. Don't 'Dean' me!" Dean yelled angrily. "You have had some stupid ideas but this…"

River quietly exited the bathroom rubbing her damp hair with a towel. "Did you know?" Dean asked jabbing a finger towards her as she tried to sneak past him to the coffee pot.

"Hmmm?" She mumbled pouring a cup of coffee and dreading the swirling argument she was getting pulled into.

"Sam's brilliant plan to let the Devil ride his carcass?"

"Oh yeah. That. He may have mentioned it…" River said quietly avoiding Dean's angry glare.

"We have no idea how to get Satan back in the pit and this is just an idea. A stupid idea because that seems to be the only kind we can come up with. It just…came up like a nuclear-fucking-option."

"So you guys have been planning this being my back?" He yelled.

"No. There is no plan. It's a 'what if' ; what if we actually get all the rings, then what? How do we get the cage open? How do we get Lucifer back In it? I can do this. I can get back him back into the cage." Sam said.

"It's not like the Super Friends had a secret meeting at the Hall of Justice without you Aquaman. Relax." River told Dean who started angrily pacing the small room; his boots stomping on the threadbare carpet.

"Relax? I'm gonna kick your ass." Dean pointed at each of them. "I'm gonna kick both your asses."

River looked across the room at Sam who rolled his eyes at Dean's temper tantrum. "So hot stuff, you want us to get in line so you can kick our asses in succession or is it gonna be more like a Royal Rumble? Staggered entrances, you gotta toss us over the top rope, last man standing gets a big shiny belt?"

"You wanna rumble let's rumble. You're first sweetheart." Dean threatened.

"Oohhh I'm scared the short Winchester's gonna kick my ass today." River taunted. He stepped towards her and she bolted around him towards the foot of their bed where she'd left her jeans. Their argument was cut short when Dean's phone started ringing in his pocket.

"Hello?" He answered the call still glaring at River who was intently reading a newspaper article she had plucked off the motel rooms chipped table.

"Hello Dean," Castiel's gravelly voice answered.

"Cas, hey man we thought you were dead." Dean said relieved to finally hear from their Angelic friend.

"Is he ok?" Sam and River asked in unison from opposite ends of the room.

Dean waived his hand at them to be quiet so he could talk. "What happened to you? Where've you been?"

Cas sighed, "In a hospital."

"A Hospital? Are you ok?"

"No…" Castiel left the answer hanging. He stared around the sterile room identical to the dozens of other hospital rooms he had visited since joining Team Free Will. Same pale white walls, cold tile floors, and he even wore a paper thin hospital gown he had seen his human friends in on too many occasions. The room was cold and unfamiliar, he missed his trench coat along with the rest of his clothing.

"You wanna elaborate Cas?" Dean asked.

"Well, I just woke up here. The doctors were very surprised. They thought I was braindead." Cas grumbled. He ran his hands through the itchy sheets until he found his nurse call button. He wanted more of that pain medicine the nurse with the pinched face and severe, librarian-style bun had brought him earlier. "After Van Nuys, I appeared bloody and disoriented on a shirmpping boat off of Delacroix."

Dean ran his thumb and forefinger across his eyebrows trying not to snap at the Angel. "Well, we're all glad you're not dead and you're just in time as usual so if you could just 'zap' to our motel that'd be great. We got a bead on Pestilence. We're leaving now to get the son of a bitch's ring."

"Dean, I can't 'zap' anywhere. That's what I'm trying to explain." Cas sighed as the nurse returned to his room with a syringe of magical medication in hand. "My….batteries, I guess you could say, are drained."

"Are you saying you're out of Angel mojo?" Dean clarified looking at River who quietly mouthed 'fuck' as her fingers subconsciously rubbed at the empty space around her neck where Gabriels necklace used to be.

Castiel's eyes fluttered as the pain meds hit his blood stream, instantly dulling the ache that permeated his every muscle. "I'm saying I'm thirsty and hungry. I have the urge to urinate every five minutes. I have a bug bite that itches no matter how much I scratch it-"

"You're human? That's what you're saying." Dean said as he sat down on the bed next to River. "Welcome to the club."

"I'm also saying I can't go anywhere without money for a plane ticket. And food. And pain medicine…"

"Alright, I'll call Bobby, he'll wire you some money and we'll meet you at his place after we deal with Pestilence."

Castiel rallied his senses before he let himself fully drift away on a haze of narcotic bliss. "Dean, you said 'no' to Michael."

"Yeah. I did." Dean sighed.

"I owe you an apology. You are not the burnt out shell of a man I thought you were. You humans continue to surprise me."

"Um…thanks Cas-Cas?" The phone clicked in his ear followed by high pitched beeping as Castiel hung up on him.

The three piled back into the car less than an hour later. The task of facing another Horseman was making them all a little extra tense. Dean and Sam wore identical taught expressions. There was no further discussion about Sam's plan to trap the Devil. In fact they said very little as they drove to the location Brady had given them. Rivers stomach churned uneasily as she replayed their run in with Famine over and over in her head as she silently slipped into an old set of nursing scrubs. The feelings of intense need, longing and loneliness that Famine had drudged up from her subconscious had humiliated her. It had taken nothing but a dismissive flick of the Horseman's hand to completely erase all control she and Castiel had over themselves. She was terrified of the terrible things that might wait for her inside the convalescent home Pestilence was using as his mad scientist lair. She checked her makeup in her small handheld mirror and sighed. "I'd kill the Pope for two hours of girl time. I need to get my god damn eyebrows threaded and a mani/pedi. If we could squeeze that in before the end of the world that'd be great." She muttered.

Dean turned in his seat to look at her. "You gonna take that thing out of your nose?"

She touched the small, shiny white stone in her nose. "This is the only piece of jewelry I own. Now that Gabe is gone and Zachariah destroyed the ring Castiel gave me. Besides its cute. And if I go in there and die, I'm gonna die cute."

Sam smiled and handed her the demon killing knife in its soft leather sheath and a fake employee badge he had put together on the ride over. She tucked the knife into the elastic band of her scrub pants and pulled her loose top over it. She double checked the hex bags she had shoved in her pockets, hopefully they would hide her true intents from any demons that might be stationed inside. Dean watched her quietly for a minute as she took several deep, nervous breaths."It's not Famine in there. It's not gonna be like last time." He said unknowingly reading her mind.

A dark pink blush flared across her cheeks and she looked away from him, nodding. "I know. I don't think Pestilence's game would be encouraging less than consensual sex acts."

"Whats the game plan?" Dean asked her distracting her from her anxious thoughts.

She let out a long breath before answering. "I go in there and figure out who's King Cootie. I'll call you once I ID him. We kill him, take his ring, go get waffles." She smiled pulling her long hair into a simple braid. It had been her plan to go in alone. Dean relented after an hour of debating with her. He couldn't come up with a better plan besides sneaking inside, overpowering the facilities security officers and waiting for a sign of the Horseman. River could slip in easier than them, pass herself off as a new employee and hopefully not tip off any demonic sentries while she searched for Pestilence. "I need you two to promise me something," she said clipping the badge onto her top, "If I go in there and it turns into Zombieland…if something happens to me, if I'm infected or turned you swear you'll put me down if I can't do it myself."

"That's not gonna happen." Dean said quickly.

She leaned forward looking between the brothers. "Zachariah showed me what the Croatoan virus is going to do. Gabriel sent me to that place because he knew what was coming. He wanted to prepare me….and I know that Delilah and the others- I know they weren't real. Not really-real but we promised each other we wouldn't let the other become one of those things." Dean shook his head refusing to answer; the deafening sound of the gunshot she used to kill herself in Zachariah's future echoing in his head. She placed a hand on each of their shoulders making them look at her. "I love you two more than anything, I trust you with my life and I need you to promise me if something happens in there tonight or out here if we don't stop this, you will take care of me if I need you to."

Sam nodded quickly. "Dean?" she asked quietly. He nodded silently. "Ok, well now that the formalities are done with, keep your phones close."

"You got this, Riv," Sam told her as she climbed out of the car.

She paused and smiled at them. "Of course I do. I came her to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum." She put her glasses on, nervously touched her hair and hurried across the street. They were betting on her being dismissed or ignored by any demons. She couldn't hide her bright coppery hair on such short notice but hopefully with her loose scrubs, tattoos covered and if she kept her filthy mouth shut as much as possible she could slip in and do recon with out tipping anyone off.

The faint stench of old urine and arthritic muscle ointment permitted the air inside the brightly lit facitlity. There were a few confused residents scooting themselves along the clean, clutter free hallways. Nurses and aides bustled in and out of rooms. A guard sat at the front desk monitoring the front doors and a bank of grainy black and white security cameras. "Same old same old." River thought to herself remembering countless identical convalescent homes she'd visited during nursing school. There was no stench of sulfur or the rotting aroma of decaying flesh that usually accompanied groups of zombies. "Hi, I'm Jenny from Nurses Stat agency. The charge nurse called and said there a shift shortage tonight." River said smiling at the young man in the rent a cop uniform.

"Yeah. Ok, sign in here. Nurses stations around the corner." He replied sliding a guest log across the counter towards her. After scrawling a fake name onto the log she wandered down one of the long hallways. She'd learned a long time ago that as long as she looked like she belonged no one would stop and question her. She spent nearly an hour investigating each room, talking to a few of the more cognizant residents and had seen no demonic activity or signs of the Horseman. She pulled out her phone ready to text Dean that they had been duped by Brady when she noticed a room at the far end of the hallway. It had bright orange signs and a metallic yellow cart stationed outside. "ISOLATION DO NOT ENTER WITHOUT PROPER PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT" the signs read as she slowly approached the room. She peered thought the dark blinds and saw a skeletally thin woman sitting up in bed. She coughed loudly and hacked up a thick green glob of something disgusting onto the tile floor.

"Hey! I need a hand in this room!" A nurses aid yelled from down the hall. River looked over her shoulder towards the waiving woman then back to the dark room.

"I'm coming," she yelled back jogging towards the nurses aid. She helped the nurses aid wrangle a confused octogenarian back to bed. "Hey, what can you tell me about that iso room? How contagious is it?" She asked the other woman.

"Very. No one's allowed in there except Dr. Green and Kim, his private nurse." She answered.

River nodded, "Dr. Green? Is he here?"

The woman glanced at her watch, "Yeah he should be here any time." River followed the other woman out of the room. A sudden waive of dizziness and nausea slammed into her causing River to stumble into the woman in front of her. The nurses aid fell to her knees, moaning in agony then painted the floor and wall with a sick foul smelling green soup of projectile vomit. The woman collapsed at her feet and River unsteadily stepped over her body. Patients and staff members dropped dead around her. Sweat broke out across her brow and dripped down her back, she suddenly felt like she was burning up. A sour taste filled her mouth as another waive of nausea wrenched through her stomach. She made it a few more paces before collapsing. Her trembling fingers reached for her phone and she struggled to bring it her ear. She could not find the strength to lift the phone. She squeezed one eye shut trying to focus on the lit screen, fingers shaking and slipping across the touch screen. "Damn it." She murmured as the text bubble popped up instead of calling Dean. The cool tile against her back did nothing to alleviate the burning fever raging inside of her. She let out a ragged breath feeling like her brain was a few degrees away from boiling inside her skull.

"Well, well, well. Isn't this interesting. You must have a very strong constitution to still be breathing." A soft spoken man said bending down to look at her. She blinked several times willing her eyes to focus. The voice belonged to a thin, pale older man. "Dr. Green" per the plastic name tag around his neck. He pushed his wire rimmed glassed up the bridge of his narrow nose and inspected her with keen, cold eyes. He ran one finger across her forehead collecting a drop of her infected sweat. His forked tongue darted out to taste the raging infections battering her immune system and he smiled at the cocktail of diseases he had let loose in the retirement home.

"Sir, the Winchesters are across the street in that stupid car." A second voice alerted. River saw a young woman standing behind the doctor. The pink teddy bear patterned scrubs the demon wore was an unsettling contrast to her hateful black eyes.

"Yes. Of course they are." Pestilence replied. Rivers fingers flew almost blindly across her phone sending a text to Dean as quickly as she could. "Bring her to Mrs. Smiths room. I'd like to run a few tests." He stepped past her, his shoes making hollow clicks on the tile floor as he walked towards the isolation room. The demon leaned down, roughly grabbed RIver's wrist and dragged her down the hallway following Pestilence into the dark quarantined room at the end of the hall.

"I think Brady fucked us." Dean growled drinking the last of his cold coffee from a styrofoam takeout cup.

Sam nodded, "Wouldn't be the first time a demon fucked us."

Dean drummed his fingers restlessly along the steering wheel. "We shouldn't be out here. It's been over an hour. I'm gonna go check on River."

"You go in there now and you'll blow her cover." Sam responded.

"Don't care." Dean told him reaching for the door handle. His phone vibrated with River's text message and he glanced at the screen: 'dOcTer bad 45;/Z every1 ded'. "Shit. She's in trouble." He hissed jumping out of the car. They ran across the deserted street towards the convalescent home. An elderly man was slumped over in his wheelchair just inside the entrance, bloody green vomit covering his shirt, his face a mess of open oozing pustules. Dean pulled the Colt out of his belt as he and his brother quickly took in their surroundings. The facility split off in three hallways, dead bodies lay everywhere. "Where is she?" Dean muttered to himself.

"Security monitors!" Sam called as he rushed behind the front desk. He pushed the dead guard off the desk and scanned through the dozen black and white monitors. "She's being taken into a room at the end of the West hallway." They ran towards the correct hallway, finding more bodies. The brothers recoiled as a wave of dizziness hit them. Dean's stomach clenched, Sam tripped over a dead body and clung to the handrails along one of the walls.

"I think we're headed in the right direction," Dean mumbled as he choked back the urge to vomit up his coffee. Sam grunted in agreement as they struggled down the hallway towards the room at the far end.

"Come on boys. You're late for your appointment with the doctor." The demon nurse stepped out of the dark room and crossed her arms impatiently over her chest. Dean squinted his eyes and swayed on his feet, the pink spots on her scrubs giving him something to focus on. He raised the Colt. The Demons eyebrows shot up in surprise. She still wore the same dumb look of shock when the bullet tore through her chest.

The Winchesters crawled over the dead Demon and into the room a few moments later. River lay in the middle of the room, forgotten for the time being. "Give me just a moment." Pestilence said disinterestedly. He sat on the edge of Mrs. Smith's bed, the elderly woman was taking shallow, wet breaths. Pink foam bubbled out of her lips and she weakly clawed at the blanket across her lap. "I just want to see what a touch of smallpox, a dash of Japanese encephalitis and a sprinkle of my personal favorite, Dragon Fever does to the human respiratory system. For research of course." Mrs. Smith let out one last anguished gurgling cry before falling limply onto her bed. "Very interesting…." Pestilence murmured to himself. He pulled a notebook out of his pocket and wrote a few lines. Dean pulled himself along the floor towards River; the Colt gripped tightly in his hand. Sam trailed behind him, trying to pull himself to his knees. The Horseman twisted the ornate ring on his left hand, the chartreuse stone glinting sickeningly in the dim light of the room. The brothers collapsed to the floor groaning. "You two don't look well at all. That might be because of the Scarlet fever. Or the viral hepatitis mixed with advanced syphiliys. The fever liquefying your brain as we speak is of course Lóng Fāshāo, Dragon Fever." Dean raised the pistol and fired, the shot went wide shattering a framed photo the now departed Mrs. Smith had hanging above her bed. "Now, Dean, that will not do. Can't you die quietly like your brother Sam." Pestilence chided as he walked towards him. He wrenched the gun out of the hunters hand and tossed it across the room. "Pitty about my Dragon Fever. Extremely contagious but kills people too quickly. The infected die within twelve hours but then my beautiful disease has no host to metabolize. It did cause quite a panic in Asia, though didn't it? Are you panicking? Any difficulty breathing, feeling feverish, sensing any impending doom? Can you rate your pain on a scale of 1-10?" He chuckled to himself, standing up and brushing the wrinkles out of his pants. Dean pulled himself a few feet closer to River. Her face extremely pale, red hair stuck to her forehead in sweaty clumps, a thin trickle of blood dripped from her nose. "Now she has a mixture of Ebola, endocarditis and avian influenza. She's got about five minutes before her eyeballs start to melt." Pestilence turned away from them, stepping over Sam and waiving his hands under the automatic hand sanitizer dispenser at the doorway. "Germs get a bad rap. But they are beautiful, magnificent in their design. One divine purpose. Divide and conquer. Destroy the useless, messy bags of flesh you humans are. Frankly, I've never understood why God poured so much love into you. I take honor in ravaging his weak creation."

"I've had my fill of evil monologues," Dean ground out.

"Who the hell are you?" Pestilence demanded as a third man staggered into the room.

"Cas!" Sam said relieved as the trench coat wearing Angel appeared at their moment of need.

"How'd you get here?" Pestilence asked.

"I took a bus." The Angel answered. "Don't worry. I-" He staggered forwards as Pestilences powers overcame him. He grabbed a small table to keep himself on his feet. His head swam and black spots appeared n his vision.

"How very interesting…" The Horseman remarked. "An occupied Angelic vessel but completely powerless." Castiel's hand slipped from the table and he landed heavily on his knees spitting up blood as he fell. "There's not a speck of Angel left in you, is there?" Pestilence asked bending down to inspect Castiel more closely. Dean reached one hand towards River, his fingers barely brushing against her cheek. He was sure they were done for. Lucifer was going to win. And they were all going to die in this small sad room. River's bloodshot eyes opened and she winked at him. Her hand slowly pulled at the sweat soaked scrub top revealing the Demon killing knife.

Castiel suddenly lucked forward, tackling Pestilence to the ground. "There might be a speck of Angel left in me." Cas growled as he grabbed Pestilence's twill vest and head butted him, smashing his forehead into the fleshy part of the Horseman's nose. River pulled herself weakly to her feet, the Demon knife clutched in one hand and teetered across the floor towards Castiel and the Horseman. Cas met her determined eyes and grabbed Pestilences wrists, slamming them to the ground over his head. River sank to her knees at the Angels side raising the knife. The blade sliced off most of the fingers on the Horseman's left hand including the one his powerful ring occupied. River snatched up the finger with the ring still attached to it. Pestilence roared in anger using the last bit of his strength to knock her and Castiel across the room. He heaved himself to his feet, his ruined hand clutched to his chest.

"You can't win! It's already too late!" He screeched before disappearing. The illnesses ravaging their bodies disappeared with the Horseman and the Hunters and Angel lay quietly on the cold tile for several long minutes regaining their senses.

River pulled the ring off the severed finger and held it out to Dean. "I'm not really in the mood for waffles anymore." She said giving him a sad half smile. Before they left the convalescent home she dialed 911 from one of the phones at the nurses station and reported a carbon monoxide leak.

They tiredly piled back in to the Impala. Beating Pestilence should have given them a feeling of success but instead they felt the weight of the impossible task of finding and defeating Death. Dean drove them back towards Sioux Falls. Castiel eventually fell asleep resting his head on River's lap. She ran her finger through his soft auburn hair and stared mindlessly out the window at the dark landscape. Sam talked quietly to Bobby on his cellphone updating the older hunter and asking if he'd received any leads on the last Horseman.

Eventually River too closed her eyes for several long minutes. When she opened them Dean was staring at her in the rearview mirror, his green eyes narrowed in concern. "Praying?" He asked. She nodded and looked down at Castiel. She prayed almost everyday, usually in secret, sending a quick prayer when she was alone in the shower or right before she fell asleep. "To who?"

She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth nervously. "Gabriel…I don't know where they go when they die or if he can even hear me but I pray just in case he can…I've been praying to him a lot. A lot more now that's he dead than I did when he was here. Just want to let him know I'm still alive. We're still fighting….makes me feel better. Like he might answer me one of these days." Dean nodded silently.

"Well, sounds like they have 3 out of 4 rings." Crowley drawled as Bobby hung up with Sam. Bobby spun his wheelchair around to face the Demon that had invaded his study.

"I thought I told you to stay the hell away from me!" Bobby demanded.

Crowley smiled, "Is that why you've kept my proposed contract all these months instead of destroying it?" The older hunter sneered as the thick brown parchment scroll appeared on his desk. "Now, I won't tell them that you've had this…opportunity under your hat. Instead making them fight and lose because you're so concerned over one measly little soul."

"It's my soul you want! I think I got a right to be concerned!" Bobby retorted.

"Yes. And like I made it very clear at the beginning of our bargaining this is a lease. You loan me your soul, I help you find Death. The bastards impossible to track without some very tricky magic. Look, may I be frank? You and the rest of the planet are literally at the Last Days. This is your finally chance to get the last piece of the Cage before Lucifer faces Michael."

Bobby stared at the contract. He had read, reread, translated and memorized every syllable in it. They had no other way to find Death. Without the last ring they had no plan. Crowley had stepped up and given them a way to find Pestilence. "Alright, you son of a bitch. Tell me where we find Him."

Authors note: Happy New Year! As usual thank you to everyone reading and following. Please review. I would love to say I am writing ahead and trying to finish the last few chapters but I'm not. Ha! Maybe that will be my New Year's resolution.