"What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground. And now[art]thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand; When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth." (Genesis 4:10-4:12)

Sam sighed as he hid his face in the palms of his hands. It has been four months. Four months and they had nothing except for blood. Blood was everywhere and Sam was sick of it. Dean and Abaddon had been one step ahead of them for some time now and they were taunting them every chance they got, leaving piles of dead bodies behind as "gifts". A women's monastery in Northern Greece- burned down to its foundations with all of its 72 inhabitants trapped inside. A wedding reception in Florence, Italy where all of the 180 guests were found still sitting n their assigned places with their organs in their laps. A catholic church in New Orleans where the priests were found crucified and the inside walls were painted in red with the words, "God wasn't here".

Sam didn't want to believe that Dean was responsible for any of this. "It's Abaddon", he was trying to convince himself, "She's the one behind all those killings. Dean wouldn't do this. Not Dean. Not Dean. NOT DEAN."

He slammed the book shut with frustration growing by the second. The freaking thing didn't tell him anything he didn't already know. But damned would be the day he would give up on his brother. That would never happen no matter how far gone Dean seemed to be. Not after all the crap they had to go through, not after all the sacrifices they had to make.

He remembered the last time he had spent four months trying to bring Dean back and even though it was Castiel who eventually succeeded, Sam had done everything a human being possibly could. To drag Dean out of Hell. Only that this time he needed to do exactly the opposite- to drag Hell out of Dean. And sometimes he was not even sure if that was going to be possible.

"I'm turning into something I don't wanna be, Sam."

Sam squeezed his eyes shut. Dean's smile flashed before his eyes.

His smartass brother.

"Oh, come on, Sammy, you're the Scully to my Mulder."

His stubborn brother.

"Sam, I don't care if you're the Chuck Norris of werewolf hunting, I'm still coming with ya."

His protective brother.

"This kid's dead. I'm gonna rip his lungs out!"

His vulnerable brother.

"How I feel… this INSIDE me… I wish I couldn't feel anything, Sammy. I wish I couldn't feel a damn thing."

The brother who was with him till the end.

"It's okay. I'm here. I'm not gonna leave you."

His family.

"I'm proud of us."

Sam Winchester's shoulders started to shake.

Crowley narrowed his eyes dangerously.

"Who?"

Marcus, the demon wearing a thirty something year-old veterinarian, gulped before answering.

"Almost half of third division, sir. And second division's starting to crumble as well. Word's spreading fast".

The King of Hell pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger and muttered:

"This is a problem."

Talking about the understatement of the year. Crowley was losing soldiers and he was losing them fast. Dean and Abaddon had promised every demon, every corrupted soul that followed them, more power, more freedom and more blood. No more deals with humans. No more drawbacks. And that once Hell was theirs, the ground above it was going to be next, whatever that meant. And Crowley loved pain and misery as much as the next demon but he knew that for the universe not to fall apart and disintegrate into a giant steaming pile of crap, there had to be some sort of balance between Heaven, Hell and Earth for them to continue to exist. The last guy who tried to mingle those three together was Lucifer and look at how well that played out. Dean had to know this better than anybody else, especially after he 'd lost his brother in order to stop the Apocalypse. But maybe that Dean had died the moment he'd woken up with black eyes. Maybe that Dean was lost forever.

It had started after they had gotten their first "message" a couple of months back. That weak-kneed crossroads demon whatshisname. Lance. Luke. Larry. They got all seven boxes of Larry that day and when they opened them Crowley was on the verge of puking. And making the King of Hell nauseous was something not just anybody could achieve. Larry's peeled off face had a heart shaped piece of paper stuck on the inside. "Voting for new Prom King and Queen is now open. Chose wisely."

He of course gave his big speech afterwards about how this whole thing was nonsense and that the demons on his side should not fall for cheap tricks and threats that wouldn't amount to actions and were completely unfounded. But he could see it in their eyes. The fear. The veneration for Dean Winchester. The contemplation of "treason to the Crown". The seeds of doubt were sown in their black, twisted souls and harvest was on its way.

Dean Winchester. He almost laughed hysterically. And he would have, just an year ago, even less, called it all bollocks. The righteous man who was supposed to end the Apocalypse by being the vessel of Michael. The man who had made it his life mission to "help people and hunt things" as his father had taught him. His father's obedient little soldier. When Crowley first met him, Dean practically had halos shooting out of his ass. The last man he thought would ever get corrupted by darkness. Crowley did like him once. Even thought they were friends. It turned out, they never were.

When Dean had turned into a demon, Crowley had been thrilled to have him on his side. To teach him his ways, so to say. To have him as his right hand man… Little did he know that his plan wouldn't work out quite the way he had expected it to. Little did he know that Dean Winchester would be darker and more powerful than any demon he had met before, except for Lucifer himself. He couldn't reason with him. He couldn't control him. The truth was , Dean didn't have a demon inside of him that could be exorcised back to Hell and punished for its mischief. No, as he had told Sam, the only demon inside of Dean was his own. And the ruthlessness of his actions shocked even the most sadistic of demons.

So it was true what they said then. The higher you fly the harder you fall. And the brighter you shine, the darker it would be when that light goes off.

Dean was a Knight of Hell. And not just any other Knight, no-he wore the Mark of Cain which made him the most powerful demon in Hell-maybe (certainly) more powerful than Crowley, but he didn't dare say it out loud. Not only that, but he had another Knight by his side now. Both planning a war to take over Hell. He needed to do something about it and if he wanted to have a snowball's chance in Hell of winning he had to act right away.

"Your Majesty?"

Crowley was forced out of his thoughts and stared at the demon in front of him who was seemingly waiting for an answer to a question he hadn't heard.

"What?"

"I said, what action would you like me to undertake, sir?"

Crowley knew what he had to do. He most certainly didn't want to do it but he had no other choice, not with them rapidly losing demons to freaking Dean Winchester. If they were going to prepare for a war, they needed an army. Just not the one he initially had in mind. Crowley just hoped the plan would work. Stupid. This is without a doubt the stupidest plan I've had, he thought to himself.

"If we want to keep Hell", he said nevertheless and his gaze pierced Markus' eyes as his tongue tasted his next words and finding the flavor unnatural, burning his lips as they escaped through them,

"We're going to need Heaven."