A/N: Our seas 10 timeline is current, minus a few changes. There is NO Rowena. Crowley hasn't got the blade yet, so he hasn't been dissed by Dean…and away we go!

Cht 5

Nate stepped further into the foyer of Sterling's apartment and quietly closed the door behind him. Sam shifted his stance and glanced at Dean, who raised the Colt once more.

"Who the hell are you? And where's your buddy, Sterling?" he growled.

Nate took two more steps forward off the devil's trap on the floor, and Dean spared a glance over his shoulder at Sam. Sam's gaze flicked to the floor, then back to Dean. Not a demon, his gaze said. Dean lowered the gun but kept it cocked and aimed at the floor, ready to raise a moment's notice.

"The name's Nate, and you're right, I am a friend of Sterling's. He's told me all about you boys, and that you would most likely be here."

"So what are you doing here?" Sam queried.

"I am here in his stead," Nate replied. "For exactly the reason you said. I am his friend, and he is being held hostage. By whatever is inside him."

"Son of a bitch!" Dean spat. "Are you kidding me? Again, we're dealing with this?!"

"Dean, hang on," Sam placated, then turned to Nate. "What do you mean he's being held hostage?"

"Well, it's like this boys," Nate said as he walked to the sideboard table in the living room. He picked up a Baccarat decanter and poured two fingers into the glass he found beside it, then gestured with the decanter to the boys. Sam merely shook his head; Dean cleared the gun and holstered it. "Sure, why not," he said gruffly.

"What the demon told me," Nate continued, "is that you tasked him out to find a relic. A blade that he had secreted away."

"Yeah," Dean said gravelly, "which he double crossed us over and we want back!"

"You weren't double-crossed. He didn't know the full extent of what it would do. That much he asserts is true, and I believe him."

"Believe him?" Sam scoffed. "You heard yourself, he's a demon!"

Nate simply held up a hand for quiet. Dean started to protest again, but Sam gestured to him to be quiet. "Be that as it may, he is not unlike a human in that he has certain tells. I can read people—and apparently demons—fairly well. I'm in the business, you could say."

Nate sat in an armchair nearby and crossed his legs amiably, as if telling a charming anecdote.

"So when Sterling called me, and he began asking me questions about my being raised Catholic, I got a little interested. He wanted me to help him find a relic which he swore was part of an investigation he was doing. The relic had been stolen and he was trying to recover it."

"That limey little mook stole it—" Dean interrupted, only to be cut off by Sam, who was determined to get the story out.

"It was stolen from him," Nate reasoned. "He is trying to get it back, and that's what he wants me to help him with, in order to get him to release his hold on Sterling. The demon was using, as I understand it, a retired Secret Service agent before, but that wasn't going so well. Now he's taken over Sterling's body, and he wants my team and I to recover the artifact so that he can get back to whatever level of hell he's from and move on."

"That'll never happen, you know that right?" Dean murmured. "He's going to keep wearing your pal Sterling as a meat suit and never give that shit up once he's got what he wants from you."

"He'll cooperate," Nate said. "If he doesn't, he knows I'll get a priest and do whatever I have to do to get my friend back. He's not much of a friend, but he's mine, and he's helped me out of a bind or two before."

"Okay, so how are you and your team going to find this thing?" Sam asked at last.

"We'll figure it out," Nate smiled, "it's what we do. And if it should happen to be something…supernatural, we'll hit up you guys and let the experts handle it. Once we have positive control over this 'First Blade' as he called it, we keep it as neutral parties once you boys are done with it. That's part of Sterling's and my deal, as security that you-" he indicated Dean, "—don't go off the rails again, as he put it."

"And where is Sterling now," Sam wanted to know. Dean had grown pensive and quiet.

"Sterling is safe," Nate replied. "I need him to help me narrow down where the blade might be. You boys, I will assume, can stay here if you like. It will make it easier for us to meet up that way. I'll keep you updated on our progress, and if I need to find you I'll look here or give you a call. We'll swap numbers before I leave, if you like. If you have any lore compiled, I would like to take a look at it tomorrow at some point. But in the meantime, get comfortable and enjoy the digs, courtesy of Sterling. I'd say it looks like we'll be working together for the foreseeable future."

With that, he rose and offered a hand to each of the boys in turn before placing the glass on the coffee table and pulling out his cell phone to swap numbers. As he did so, Sam and Dean swapped a look that both understood to mean that they would be having a lengthy discussion as soon as Nate left.