The wheels on the cart squeak, loud and nerve wracking. The sound could be compared to nails on a chalk board. A scratchy wool blanket - army green in color - old and fragrant of mold, keeps the contents of the cart from being revealed to anyone other than the one who selected it. A short hallway, engulfed in darkness, seems longer than what its true length is as every step brings him closer.
"Heaven," a raspy voice starts singing as the cart comes closer to him. "I'm in heaven. And my heart beats so that I can hardly speak," the voice continues off key.
Heavy booted steps echo around the room in between the man's pauses for breaths.
"I seem to find the happiness I seek." squeak, step, squeak, step. "When we're out together dancing cheek to cheek," the man sounds more and more excited as the cart approaches him.
He's gangly looking with graying hair and beard and lazy eyes. No doubt was a man in his mid to late fifties before be became a meat suit for the demon inside. He is bound to an iron forged Star of David. The chains that bind him, also made of iron, hold him much like Christ on a crucifix - arms stretched wide, ankles joined together. Underneath the worn black work boots, a pentacle is painted with elegant symbols emblazoned in silver. Both the men know that its language is Enochian. A language far stronger than that of the Latin used in most traps, this language was created by God himself as a way to speak to his angelic armies.
The man restrained for crucifixion begins to laugh, a sinister scratchy laugh as the cloth is slowly removed from the cart. Deliberately the items are revealed. Each instrument carefully selected to guarantee the best possible outcome.
The man starts to taunt in between his laughter, apologizing for finding such an emotional and serious situation as funny as he does. He is warned that he has one chance to give the name the Angels seek.
"You think I would just see all of your scary toys and spill my guts?" he sneers.
Dean looks upon the man as a malicious smile crosses his lips. "Oh, you'll spill your guts, Alastair. One way or another," he chuckles darkly. "I just didn't want to ruin my shoes."
Alastair continues to taunt Dean, asking him if he's going to work him over. He laughs mockingly at Dean, telling him that he's too scared to do it, that he left a part of himself in Hell and that they should try to bring those two parts together.
Dean looks back at the various blades laid in front of him. All the pain and torture he went through at the hands of this man keeps him focused.
"Oh, come on," Alastair scoffs. "You've got to want a little payback for everything I did to you," he taunts. "All the pokes and prods."
Dean continues to focus on his tools, laying each implement down neatly, ignoring the demon's jibes.
"No?" Alastair asks when Dean does not acknowledge him. "Then how about all the things I did to your Daddy? A hundred years, I had good ol' Johnny strapped to my chair. After each session I'd make him the same offer I made you. I would put down my blade if he'd pick one up."
"Just give me the demon's name, Alastair," Dean repeated. "You might as well quit stalling."
"But he said 'Nein'," Alastair laughs again, ignoring Dean. "Each and every time. Never could break him, because John Winchester was made of the same stuff of heroes," he sighed wistfully before cackling out a laugh. "And then came daddy's little girl," he sneered as Dean removed his leather jacket.
"Dean Winchester. Couldn't make it past thirty years before you begged me. Begged me to stop." Alastair lets out an amused chuckle as Dean takes a long pull from the whiskey bottle in his hands.
"The best part is you didn't break for your Daddy. Not even for your precious little Sammy. Oh no. No, no, no, no, no. Precious Dean Winchester broke over a girl. A pretty little thing," Alastair hums and licks his lips in a lewd manner. Dean slams the glass down and replaces it with the gallon of water, black rosary beads float within. He pours the water into a chalice, earning an malevolent laugh from Alastair.
"What was her name? Oh yes, Cassandra. "
Dean bashes jug of holy water down, biting back the memory of a love lost, keeping his face stoic.
"Holy water?" Alastair shouts in question. "Grasshopper, you're gonna have to get more creative to impress me.
Dean smiles at Alastair. It's dark and full of hate. "You know something, Alastair? I could still dream, even in Hell and over and over and over. You know what I dreamt?"
Alastair confident smile waivers some but he says nothing.
"I dreamt of this moment," Dean clarifies, grabbing the syringe and six inch needle. "And believe me," he practically growls as he pieces the medical equipment together before dipping the tip into the chalice full of water, "I got a few ideas."
Alastair sneers at Dean's actions as he slowly fills the vial, meticulously taking his time to make this perfect.
Dean approaches the demon, giving the needle a gentle squeeze to release a stream of holy water. "Let's get started."
Castiel stands outside the door, unable to leave as he hears the demon groan in pain. The pain he feels inside is not for the demon but for Dean.
Dean holds the demon blade in his hand as he pours holy water on it. A beautiful piece with an ivory handle, silver serrated blade. Various runes are also engraved into the silver.
Alastair, although weakened by the holy water that now pumps through his veins, continues to taunt Dean. Alternating between lewd comments of what he would do with Cassandra's soul to boasting about how he made Dean into what he was today.
Slowly Dean approaches him, his boots scraping against the concrete floor is the only noise he makes.
"I carved you into a n-new animal, Dean," Alastair growls menacingly. "There's no turning back."
Slowly Dean pushes the blade into Alastair's stomach making the demon scream. "Maybe you're right," Dean taunts, pulling the knife up. The lethargic motion of the blade rips at Alastair's flesh. "But it's my turn to carve," he snarls, moving the blade higher into Alastair's abdomen.
Castiel leans against the drafting table just outside the room. He hangs his head, praying for Dean to have strength through this test. After all, did he not warn Dean of the tests he would be placed in, or of the weight that would be on his shoulders in due time. Castiel knew this was one of these times, even if his superiors were leaving him in the dark.
The lights over head start to flicker. Castiel looks up, with a deep exhalation of breath, he can rule out the possibility of there being a ghost, as the temperature hasn't dropped. Only one other force would have that kind of power.
Angelic.
"Hello, Castiel," a soft female voice says from behind. He turns to look over his shoulder where a redhead, no older than twenty stands before him with wide brown eyes. He's seen her before. This was the fallen angel that the Winchesters had helped to restore her grace.
"Anna, your human body…" Castiel looks away, unable to find the words he wants to say. He can still see the way her vessel was destroyed once reunited with her grace.
"It was destroyed. I know," she says her voice getting closer to him. "But, I guess I'm sentimental. Called in some old favors."
"You shouldn't be here. We still have orders to kill you." Castiel isn't sure if his words were meant as a warning or a threat.
She moves to stand beside him. Her outfit much different than the white cotton blouse and faded denim pants in which she had left the vessel before. "Somehow, I don't think you'll try," she says simply. "Where's Uriel?" she asks as an afterthought. Anna's eyes flicker to the door that separates them from the human and demon just beyond the walls before looking back at Castiel.
"He went to receive revelation."
"Right," she looks back at the door as the demon groans than laughs behind it before looking back at Castiel, disappointment clear upon her porcelain face. "Why are you letting Dean do this?"
Castiel feels his face fall at her accusation. Unwilling to let yet another one of his fellow angels see his emotions, he turns his back to her. "He's doing God's work."
"Torturing? That's God's work?" Anna questions him. "Stop him, Cas, Please! Before you ruin the one real weapon you have." Concern laced its way through her words. She knew that Castiel may not remember their past but she did and she knew this would destroy both the human and the angel.
"Who are we to question the will of God?"
"Unless this isn't His will," she says, giving a voice to Castiel's own doubts.
"Then where do the orders come from?" Castiel asked trying to maintain an even tone.
"I don't know," she responds simply. "One of our superiors maybe. But not Him."
Both angels pause their conversation and turn to the door. They can hear Alastair sputtering, choking on his own blood as Dean asks, "Who is murdering the Angels?"
Anna takes this chance to make Castiel look at her. "The Father that you love," she pauses as Castiel's brow begins to form in a scowl. "You think He wants this?" she continues. "You think He'd ask this of you?" She can see the sorrow in his blue eyes as he tries to fight it.
"You think this is righteous?" She presses. Castiel breaks eye contact as she moves closer to him. "What you're feeling, it's called doubt."
He looks at her again as he struggles internally between being the soldier he is supposed to be and his feelings that he has begun to understand.
She places her hand onto Castiel's. "These orders are wrong," she says softly as he looks at their hands. Her touch a strange mix of comfort and pain for him, "and you know it." He looks back to her face, trying to see if her words are lies.
"You can do the right thing." she pleads with her brother. "You're afraid, Cas. I was too." She squeezes his hand, reassuringly. "But together, we can-"
"Together?" Castiel interrupts. Her words should help lift the burden off of his heart but instead they feel like ice in his veins. She chose to fall from Heaven. She chose to live without her grace. She chose to rebel against their Father.
He yanks his hand from her grasp, causing her to move back. "I am nothing like you," he spat angrily. "You fell! Go."
He starts to walk away from her, anger and confusion coursing through his body.
"Cas," she calls to him. Her heart breaking as her brother, her friend, turns from her. She wants nothing more than to tell him the truth behind his bond with the human in the next room but knows Castiel, the devoted soldier that he is and always will be, will never believe her.
"Go!" He yells one last time before she disappears.
Dean had just finished pouring salt down Alastair's throat causing him to choke and cough. Dean was getting tired of the taunts. He had finally moved away from Cassandra and was telling Dean that Lilith wanted him in Hell the whole time.
Alastair coughs and spits out bloody chunks. "I'm sorry," he rasps out between coughs. "I got something in my throat." Dean clenches his jaw waiting for the demon to stop stalling.
"I think it's my throat," Alastair quips after the last bloody cough.
"Well strap in," Dean says with an unpleasant smile. "I'm just getting started." He moves back to the cart, trying to decide what tool to use next.
"It was supposed to be your father. He was supposed to bring it on," Alastair says, chuckling to himself. "But in the end it was you," he says to Dean, his laugh getting more boisterous. "You brought it on."
"Bring what on?" Dean asks in a bored tone as he cleans off the demon blade with holy water, then sprinkles it with salt.
"It all started when you said, 'sign me up.' When you picked up my razor for the first time and sliced into that weeping bitch…"Alastair trailed off causing Dean to look at him. "That was the first seal."
Son of a bitch! Dean screamed in his head, but keep at emotion from his face. If anything he appeared bored to Alastair. "You're lying," he said simply. As he approached the demon, an evil grin ghosted across his lips.
Alastair didn't take kindly to being called a liar. His whole body went rigid as he recited the prophecy. "And it is written that the first seal shall be broken when a righteous man sheds blood in Hell. As he breaks, so shall it break."
Dean scoffs and turns his back to him.
"We had to break the first seal before any others. The only way to get the dominoes to fall right was to topple the one at the front of the line."
Dean tries to control his breathing as his heart starts to race. It makes sense actually. Why else would the big bad have been there with Dean and Sam, guised as Ruby helping them, only to watch Dean get dragged to hell. After all Castiel did warn him that there were hundreds of seals, all Lilith would need is sixty six of them.
Fuck , that's at least three seals that Dean knew of that he failed to keep closed.
"When we win. When we bring on the apocalypse and burn this Earth to the ground," Alastair barbs at Dean. "We'll owe it all to you. Dean Winchester."
Dean closes his eyes, the muscles in his jaw working overtime as he tries his hardest to keep from breaking. He failed. He failed his father, his brother, even that damn angel standing outside. He failed them all.
"Believe me, son. I wouldn't lie about this."
What Dean had failed to realize was this whole time, a pipe from the water lines was slowly leaking. The constant drips against the concrete started to eat away at the paint, making the Enochian demon trap weaker with each passing moment. This, however, hadn't escaped Alastair's notice.
"No," Dean said with a shaky breath. "I don't think you are lying. Even if the demons do win," he pauses to look down at the bloody blade in his hands. Determination now seeping into his voice, "You won't be there to see it."
When Dean turns, he is now faced to face with his own personal tormentor from Hell, free of his binds. Alastair catches Dean with a right hook that knocks him to the ground. Picking the human up by the collar of his shirt, he continues, blow after blow to Dean's face. Dean's left eyebrow is split as well as his cheek and lip. He's pretty sure that his nose is broken but that does not compare the the burning in his throat as Alastair chokes him, lifting him from the ground and shoving him against the Star of David.
He feels Alastair's fingers squeeze tighter along his windpipe. "You've got a lot to learn, boy. So I'll see you back in class, bright in early in the morning," Alastair says at Dean's vision starts to fade, darkness seeping in as his brain and lungs are deprived of oxygen.
Cas, I'm sorry, I failed you.
Castiel heard Dean's last thoughts, flashing into the room and grabbing Dean's knife. Alastair hears the movement, dropping Dean's unconscious body to the floor as he turns on Castiel. The angel uses that moment to strike, plunging the blade into the demon's chest.
Alastair laughs, looking down at the blade. "Oh, almost. Looks like God is on my side today," he says smugly.
Castiel rolls his neck and lifts his hand. Using his grace he slowly twists the knife's serrated blade in Alastair's chest, earning grunts of pain from the demon. After the silver has twisted three hundred sixty degrees, Alastair raises a shaky hand to pull it out of his chest, dropping it before lunging at the angel.
Castiel moves, catching Alastair with an uppercut followed by a right hook. Alastair responds in kind and blood now runs down Castiel's forehead, stinging his eyes as he fights back with all his might. Using both hands to knock into the demon, Castiel looks like he might have the advantage.
Alastair stumbles but regains his footing. He grabs Castiel's lapels in his fist, running him into one of the support beams behind the angel. Castiel's eyes widen as the hook in the beam now pierces through the back of his vessel, slicing as Alastair yanks him down.
Castiel claws at the hands wrapped his throat, trying to free himself as the demon starts to chant the Latin spell that will send the angel back to Heaven. He tries his best not to make a sound as he can feel his true form begin to leave his body. He knows Dean won't be harmed at this point as long as he is unconscious and as long as Castiel doesn't use his voice. Alastair's face starts to reflect the blue light of Castiel's grace. Not yet, Castiel thinks, trying his best to fight against the spell.
Suddenly the pressure on Castiel's windpipe is relieved and Alastair is thrown against a wall, pinned by some invisible force. The angel manages to pull himself off the hook and slides down into a squat as he tries to regain control of his vessel.
"Who's murdering the Angels?" A voice to Castiel's left asks. Sam is there, his hand held out wide in front of him, anger clear in his eyes as he stares down the demon. "How are they doing it?"
Alastair laughs, "You think I'm gonna tell you?" Sam responds by moving his fingers as if clenching the demon's throat. Alastair's eyes turn a milky white as he starts to gag.
"How are the demons killing the angels?" Sam asks again, anger being replaced by rage.
Castiel looks between the younger Winchester to the demon. He knows there is something happening with Sam to make him this powerful and yet he can't seem to bring the truth to mind as he watches in stunned silence.
"I don't know!" Alastair grunts out between breaths as Sam's power chokes him more. "It's not us!"
It's not us ? Castiel questions what he just heard. If not the demons then who? Was Anna right? Could there be forces in Heaven who are behind the slaughtering of his brothers and sisters?
"Lilith is not behind this," the demon tries to growl out. It feels like everything is clicking into place for Castiel. Of course she's not. This was insignificant to her compared to the seals.
"She wouldn't kill seven angels," Alastair continues, his words bringing Castiel back to the information Sam was now getting. "She'd kill a hundred," Alastair taunts with an evil smirk at Castiel. "Thousands."
Sam relaxes his fist and posture, letting go of the demon. Alastair pants, taunting Sam to send him back to hell. Sam tells him that he's stronger now and can kill the demon.
Castiel's eyes are wide as he looks at Sam. This was new. This also confirmed his previous thoughts about Dean's little brother. Sam was taking the abilities given to him by the yellow eyed demon and increasing their strength. There was only one way that Castiel knew that could be done. Sam had been ingesting demon blood. Dean is going to be so pissed!
Sam calmly looks at Alastair as the demon screams. A bright yellow light starts to seep through the chest of the human he has possessed, moving itself up until it reaches his eyes. Then almost as suddenly as it has started, it ends. The once living and breathing human slumps to the floor. Nothing more than a corpse - a sad consequence to the possession of a demon as opposed to what the angels do with their vessels.
Sam has a proud smirk on his face as he looks at the body. He had finally did it. Shown the angels that he is stronger than his brother. His eyes are met with the angel's blue ones, which are narrowed in both anger and disappointment. Why was he disappointed with the younger Winchester? Castiel couldn't place it at this time but something in the back of his thoughts was scratching to answer it.
Right now, there was something more important to take care of. Dean.