Sam's eyes darted past the demon to his brother, his normal puppy expression replaced by something beyond rage. Dean had curled into a ball, clutching at the ragged holes in his t-shirt in a vain and desperate attempt to staunch more blood seeping from his body.

Dean's eyes locked with Sam's as moisture once again filled the younger Winchester's eyes and began to stream down his blotchy cheeks.

Don't you give into him, Sammy…

Dean was too tired, too damaged to speak it outright, but Sam saw the message loud and clear as if it had been hailed through a megaphone. No matter what, his brother didn't want him to yield, didn't want him to prove the demon was right all along about Sam's true nature. No, Dean wanted Sam to keep the thing talking, to buy time. But to what end?

"A pitiful sight, if I do say so…" Azazel refused to turn and waste his paranormal energy on Dean, instead remaining focused on his true target. "What's it to be, Sammy?"

A fresh grunt of pain gurgled from Dean's lips and he gasped down a breath as if it might be his last. Closing his eyes he tried to control the unreasonable urge he had to cough. Coughing only made his fractured ribs feel like they were coming through his side or worse.

Sam couldn't help but look away, at the wall, anywhere but the tortured form of his brother.

The wall.

Without even realizing it, Sam's gaze settled on the section of corridor that held the alarm junction box they'd been seeking. Except now, the fresh paint on the wall was not only covered by a slick trail of Dean's blood, but also by a stomach-turning black patch that signaled the alarm, or at least something was burning behind the plaster.

Fir in Wals…

Sam blinked, looking back to the demon without acknowledging he'd seen the beginning of the now inevitable fire. The building was going to burn, and Dean was going to die unless he did something. What was more he didn't even have the luxury of time to be able to stall his foe, and yet somehow, he must.

"If I'm to join you, I at least deserve to know why? Why choose me to give your damn gifts to? Why kill Mom, Jess, everyone I've ever cared about..?"

Azazel ran a hand through his hair - John's hair and then scratched at his temple, pretending to have to think about the question for a second. "Why?" His smile broadened. "Because I can. Death is what you might call my occupation, my calling on this puny planet. And you? You were meant to be part of that calling. And you will be…"

"No." Sam shook his head. He had gifts, maybe evil gifts, but he was sure of one thing. "I'm no devil's son. I had a mother, father." He glanced fleetingly behind the demon, eyes full of despair. "A brother…"

"You're human, I never disputed that. Born to a family with too many delusions of grandeur in the demon hunting department, but still human." Azazel smirked and he leaned forward, whispering with John's voice. "But you, Sammy? Your soul was sold long ago to me by your mother, although at the time she didn't even know it."

"Liar!" Sam spat the rebuke, but already his mind began to whirl back to a past experience. When he and Dean had returned home to Lawrence, Mary's spirit at been in their old home, and she had spoken to him, a look of sadness and regret tinting her ghostly features.

Sam, I'm sorry…

For what?

Mary had never answered his question; never put his mind at rest. Could the evil thing before him really be telling the truth? "It's not possible," Sam muttered in defeat, still seeing the burning figure of his mother as if it had been yesterday.

Azazel noted the sudden change in Sam's demeanor and turned, focusing now on Dean. The elder brother was still conscious and glared back, half expecting a further surge of agony from his tormentor.

Instead, the demon kneeled, cupping Dean's blood covered chin in his left hand. "Do you remember, Dean? Do you recall the last really fun day you had in your life with dear Daddy? That was the day your brother became mine…"

Sam took a step forward. "How can Dean know?"

Azazel let the elder hunter's head slip from his grasp and roll back onto the corridor's cold floor tiles. "I can show you both. Maybe it is time you learned the truth…"

Sam shook his head and was about to ask how, but suddenly he didn't need to. His mind began to lurch as if someone was trying to fine tune a radio to the best frequency. All his thoughts seemed to merge and then vanish to be replaced by something else – a vision, a memory of something he had never been around to see.

On the floor, Dean's already bleary eyes seemed to glaze over as he too was somehow subjected to the very same visualization.

"Daddy, Daddy! I want the white one!" The tiny form of Dean Winchester tugged on his father's leather jacket as he bounced up and down in excitement. Around him, crowds jostled and pushed as a milling throng enjoyed the fun fair passing through Lawrence.

"Son, you have to win it. You can't just have it without making the effort." John kneeled until he was crouching to the same height of his only child. "You have to be a pretty good shot at this game to win a Bear like that…"

Dean's features lit up and he looked at the bear again with glee. "Mom says you're the best shot in Kansas!"

"Only Kansas?" John feigned a gasp of surprise and ran a hand playfully through the front of his son's hair. "I think I'll have to have words with Mom tonight." He smiled, picking up Dean and setting him on the counter of the shooting gallery.

"Words with Mom?" Mary Winchester eased into the gap beside her husband, wrapping an arm around his waist. "What have I done to deserve that kind of attention?"

"Daddy's going to win me a bear!" Dean nodded, pointing at the huge white Teddy he had selected for John to try and win.

"Oh, John, it's almost time to go and you know you promised we could visit the fortune teller before we leave…" Mary looked disappointed. Fun fairs were a great place to be with your family, but something had been eating at her lately. Something she wanted answers to. Maybe a gypsy palm reader was a stupid way to expect answers, but she was here anyway, what could it hurt?

"But my bear…" Dean's lip quivered and his saddened gaze met the floor. He swung his tiny feet too and fro in frustration even before anything more was said.

"Oh honey, you know those gypsies just make it all up. They tell you what you want to hear just to get your money…" John was torn between his son's bitter disappointment and his wife's frustration. That meant he was more than likely going to offend one to please the other.

Mary couldn't help a small laugh, pushing her long blonde hair from her eyes as it blew haphazardly in the wind. She knew John was right – he always was. But still, she yearned for something she apparently couldn't have. "It still might be nice to see what the old crystal ball says about our future, John," she asked persuasively.

John cringed teasingly. "Actually, I'd rather not know. Why don't you go on ahead and I'll bring Dean along after we win the bear?" He smiled, bobbing his head to the small fortune teller's hut that had been erected.

"Alright." Mary let her hand slide from around John's waist and settled a brief kiss on his cheek. "But if she tells me we're winning the lottery I might not still be around when you get there." She winked, sauntering off towards the hut before John could respond.

Dean's head cocked to one side. "Dad?"

John laughed. "Nothing, sport. What say I show you how to shoot this thing and we get that big ol' bear now?" He picked up the age-worn rifle on the counter and took a look down the sights. Not exactly the greatest thing to shoot with, but he'd manage. "Now then, son, the first thing you've gotta do is think about what you're aiming at…"

Mary could still hear John's bottomless voice as she entered the small shack and a tiny bell above her tinkled. It was great to spend a day together, to see her husband having so much fun with their son, and yet, Mary wanted more.

She looked around, spotting a small table and two chairs through a thin veiled curtain. In the middle of the table sat the crystal ball she had been so eager to see into.

Did she really want to know, though?

"Welcome. Please take a seat…" A young woman about Mary's age and very smartly dressed appeared from the rear of the hut. She wore ordinary clothes and had her long, dark hair down over her shoulders.

Mary almost had to do a double take. Somehow, she had expected a wrinkled old woman with huge earrings wearing a colorful scarf over her hair. This isn't the turn of the century or the movies. What was I thinking?

Mary took the seat that she was offered and watched as the young gypsy settled down opposite her. Already, she had the intense feeling that she was being scrutinized far more than she had ever intended, and it was unnerving. No, it was more than that. It was as if the fortune teller really did know all about her already, just by setting eyes on her.

"You want something, but your husband thinks it's far too soon…"

Mary began to wring her hands, but nodded. If this person knew the truth, then maybe they had the answer she sought too. "I…I want another child, but John thinks we should wait. I…I just think it would be good for Dean, my son to have a brother or sister. He shouldn't be alone all his life…"

The gypsy's eyes darkened and seemed to swirl in the poorly-lit room. "And you fear Dean will never have one, don't you?"

"I would give anything for another son. Anything. Dean needs someone his own age to play with, to have fun with and I just don't think it's going to happen. I mean, John is great father but Dean needs to be around other kids…" Mary shook her head. This was coming out all wrong.

"You'd give anything?" The fortune teller smiled, letting a hand gently caress the transparent glass ball before her. "You know, Mrs. Winchester, you really should be careful with your choice of words…"

John waited patiently for ten minutes outside the tiny hut before his grip on Dean began to loosen. The little guy alone was quite a weight on his arm as the father carried him, but atop the kid now sat a huge white bear just to add to the awkwardness of the load.

"Time to go down, sport." The smiling father had no sooner set his grinning son down than his wife appeared from inside the fortune teller's with a similar smile across her face. "Hey, how did it go? I take it from your mere presence there isn't a lottery win in the near future?"

Mary hooked an arm around John's free one and let her other hands grasp Dean's tiny palm. "Oh, not a lottery win, but something even better…"

"Honey, there's something better?" John asked good-humoredly.

"We're going to have another child…at least, according to the gypsy. She even said it would be born in May…" Mary waited for the response, but the first didn't come from where she'd expected.

"Mommy, can you please make it a brother?" Dean's eyes glistened and both Winchesters had to stop and look at him with a smile. Apparently, despite his body's small stature, his ears were fully grown and working perfectly. "It would be so cool to have a brother to shoot with next time we come to the fair!"

Mary laughed at his innocent expression of glee. "It's funny, but the gypsy did say it would be a son. She even said we'd name him Sam."

John gave a muted gasp. "Sweetheart, no way am I ever gonna call my son Sam. People will shorten it to Sammy and that's so girlie…" The father winked at Dean as he spoke, ruffling the youngster's hair again with a small smile.

As the Winchesters walked away from the fair towards a certain black Chevy, the scene began to fade, to dissipate until all that was left in front of Sam was once again the grinning form of the demon in his father's guise.

"Now do you see you've always been mine, Sammy?" The demon leered, watching and enjoying as Dean squirmed on the floor at what he too had been shown. "Why do you think I put the name Samuel in your mother's mind? Samhain, Sammy, the time when the veil between our worlds is thinnest and I may reign stronger here."

Sam shook his head. His mother hadn't known what she was doing. Hadn't known she was selling her second son to a demon by using a few inapt words in its presence. No wonder Mom's ghost said sorry back in Lawrence…

The demon ignored Sam's silence, taking it for defeat. "You were marked from birth, just like so many other children. It's amazing what people will say or do when they wish for children they think can't have, Sammy…So many women visiting the gypsy in town's all across the country…"

"Except there never was any gypsy, was there? It was you all along you bastard!" Sam spat angrily, realizing how so many innocent people had been deceived. "And the kids, they're all the gifted ones like me. You took our mother's as payment just like the crossroads demon took payment for what it gave – except you really never gave anything. And then you marked us somehow when we reached six months old…"

Azazel stepped in front of Dean's prone form, putting his back to the hunter once again so he could get within a hairsbreadth of Sam's face. "And now, now I'm reaping my harvest…"

Sam stood his ground, even though every fiber of his being was screaming the fight was already over. Dean was dying, and his own soul had been sold long ago. How could they escape this fate, this destiny of death and darkness? "Why Jess?" He barked, feeling his throat becoming raw with all the yelling.

The demon's eyes flashed. "Didn't I tell you in Missouri, psychic boy? Jess was in the way. How could I allow you to marry her when your union may have spawned more gifted children? Gifted children whose powers would not fall under any of my deals like the other brats I created. They could have used their gifts against me…"

"And you think just because my mother made a deal with you I can't use mine against you?" Sam took a step back. He still had nothing to fight with accept his own defiance, but hell, that sometimes worked for Dean, didn't it? Why can't I make the damn gifts work when I need them? "I don't care where my gifts come from. I won't help you with them. I won't stand alongside you and use them to kill, because that's what you want, isn't it?"

"Not even for your brother?" Azazel inhaled, and for a second Sam expected more screams from Dean as his body was crushed beneath the demon's hellish claws. Instead, the thing continued its word game. "You've used your gifts to save him once, even though you didn't realize it at the time. Isn't that already accepting them, accepting your fate? I can hurt him more, if you want, Samuel…"

"And if you kill Dean," Sam countered. "You kill the only hold you have on me now Dad is gone. Then what? You really think I'd help you here? Help you kill hundreds of helpless school kids just to satisfy your death fetish? I'd rather die myself than become that person."

Azazel let out the breath he had taken, and suddenly Sam found himself weightless. His body rose above the flooring just enough to make it appear he was floating on some invisible carpet of the Gods. He had no control over his limbs, no control over his muscles as some bizarre paralysis took a hold of his lanky body.

The demon's fetid breath met his nostrils as it rose to his height. "Rather die than join me? I can make that happen too…"

tbc...