Chapter One

~World Between Worlds~

He was leaving. And even though she had accepted that fact, Celine still hated the thought of letting him go. But she had to. He wasn't hers to keep. No matter how close they had gotten this past year. She had to let him go.

But as Mark turned to step through the portal and get back to his life, Celine reached out and touched his arm. She resisted the urge to grab him and pull him to her.

"I'll make sure he won't come after you," Celine said, speaking of Dark, who had escaped into a portal of his own a few moments ago. She had told Mark and his friends that she would close the portal, preventing Dark from traveling between universes. "I can close the doors, but I can also open them back." She reached up and kissed him on the lips then smiled. "You should learn not to trust me."

From the look in his eyes, Mark understood that she was going after Dark. Because she still believed the good in him could be saved? Not anymore, but Mark didn't need to know that.

"Be careful," Mark said. She nodded then watched as he stepped through the portal and disappeared from her life once again.

Celine closed the portal, wondering whether or not she should catch a glimpse of his life now that he was back home. But she decided against it. It would be too tempting to try and bring him back here. To her. He wasn't the Mark she had known, but he could have been one she could love.

Just like every other Mark Dark had trapped here. She had thought it was just to see if he had the right Mark, but there had to be more to it than that. Dark was trying to distract her. But why?

Celine was the Keeper of this World Between Worlds. Dark couldn't escape from her.

And he hadn't.

Celine turned and dropped the illusion the others had seen. Of Dark escaping through a portal. In reality, he had never left. He was laying on the floor, unconscious, thanks to her. The wound from the gunshot had already healed, the small pool of blood around him already drying.

He had bragged about this place being his domain, but had never considered the possibility that she could grow stronger than him here. Leaving her in this world was his last mistake.

So he was going to help her get out.


~Kansas, 2018~

At first he thought his Visions had returned. It was the only explanation for the strange, unfamiliar symbols he saw in his dream. But it hadn't felt like a Vision. So then what was it?

Sam Winchester was up early, around four a.m., but he hadn't been able to go back to sleep. With those symbols fresh in his mind, Sam started researching. But after a few hours, there was still nothing to show for it.

The symbols stared up at him from the page. Something in the back of his mind told him he knew the solution to this. That the answer was staring him in the face.

"Sam?"

Sam looked up to see Castiel standing there across the table from him. The last year suddenly weighed on Sam all over again. Castiel's death, Castiel being brough back by Lucifer's son, Jack, Mary Winchester and Jack both trapped in the Apocalypse World...

Castiel was eyeing the papers and books strewn across the table. "Are you researching a new case?" the angel asked.

"Not exactly," Sam said then stood and began gathering up the papers. "I had this weird dream last night. Thought it might have been a Vision, but..." He gestured to the table. "Turned up nothing."

"What did you dream?" Castiel looked at the paper Sam handed over to him.

"It might've been just something I ate yesterday," Sam said. "Enough weird stuff has been happening -"

"You only saw these symbols?" Castiel interrupted. He looked away from the page, his eyes meeting Sam's.

Sam nodded his head, trying to remember more of his dream, but only the symbols stood out. "Why?" he asked. "Do you know something about those symbols?"

"Do you remember when we were in Los Angeles?"

Something rang familiar. "The Darkiplier case?" Sam asked. Castiel nodded. "What do these symbols have to do with that?"

Castiel put the paper down and drew another symbol, but it was similar enough to the others for Sam to know it was in the same language. And the symbol Cas had drawn was one Sam had seen before, in Los Angeles.

During the Darkiplier case, Dark had recruited six men to take out one. All six men each had a tattoo on their collarbone. The symbol Cas had just drawn now. At the time, Sam had thought it was a protection spell, but Dean had been informed that it meant 'Darkness.' Implying that those who had the tattoo were Darkiplier's property. Dark had ended up killing all six men.

"Dark is back?" Sam asked. He had had a similar dream warning him of Dark's return once before, but these symbols had never appeared. "But Celine said she closed the door."

"Celine?"

"A friend of Mark's," Sam said. "Dark has her trapped in a World Between Worlds, as she called it. It was how Dark was able to travel."

"You ended up there as well?"

Sam sat back down, wishing he didn't have to say it, but Castiel deserved to know the truth. "When you killed Dark...it was actually Mark," he said, watching as Castiel processed that information. "He ended up in that world with Celine. For a year."

"Because of me."

Sam didn't want Cas to take the blame for it. "Dark planned on trapping him there from the beginning," he said. "We were all tricked into doing what Dark wanted."

"And Mark's...safe now?"

"As far as we know," Sam said. He hadn't heard anything from Amy in months. He had chosen to view that as a good thing. But if Dark was back... "Dark escaped into another world. Celine promised she would keep him from coming back here." And everyone had believed he wouldn't even want to come back. Amy had assured them of that after revealing Dark getting too in touch with his human side.

Was that something to disbelieve as well?

"If he is back," Castiel said, glancing down at the symbols. "This might tell us where."

"He'd just go after Mark again."

"But there IS a clue here."

And the answer was staring him right in the face! "Dr. Bates," Sam said, getting to his feet again. "She had everything she knew about Dark in her computer." And he had printed out those files for just in case. "She was the surgeon. She had to have tattooed the patients. She knew what those symbols meant."

"She was also obsessed with ruling at Dark's side," Castiel said, following as Sam moved off to another room. "How do we know these symbols won't summon him back here?"

Sam ducked into the room they kept past records. "Hopefully her files will shed some light on that," he said then grabbed a box off a shelf.


~In the Mind~

"You have to wake up."

There was darkness as far as the eye could see. Much different than the darkness he was used to. This darkness felt empty...hollow...maddening. As if he was trapped in his own mind. The suffering of the demented.

"You are trapped."

Dark turned and came face-to-face with...himself. Damien. A blue glow surrounded him, giving off the only light, but Dark new a light wasn't needed.

"Demented is a bit of a stretch, don't you think?" Damien said. "We're all sane here, aren't we?"

"It's only the two of us."

"Wrong!" Damien snapped, brandishing the cane he had always carried around. "There's never been two. I'm as much you as you are me."

"Celine wants to separate us."

"Separate us?" Damien shook his head. Dark could feel his disappointment in Celine. Because they were the same person. "There's no 'us.' Just me. It's always been just me."

"What happened in Los Angeles -"

"Celine's been messing with my head the whole time," Damien said. He gestured around. "And she's still doing it!"

Dark's anger grew, his need to get rid of Celine overpowering any desire for revenge against Mark. "She's trapped me here," he said.

Damien nodded. "And I have to wake up."