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- Dean's POV -

As soon as Diana had hit the ground, Sam and I scrambled down from the hayloft, our feet finding the ground just in time to see Crowley smirk at us, grab the limp Diana and disappear in a puff of red smoke.

"Goddammit!" I yelled, punching my fist through the rotting barn wall. "I knew he'd turn on us! Cas, what the hell!" But when we looked over, Cas had disappeared.

"He was in on it," Sam whispered in disbelief. "I knew we shouldn't have trusted him!"

"What the hell is going on!" Kara yelled. "I got a call requesting back up for a couple of hunters in a sticky situation and I track them down, throw myself into a demon brawl, and come to find that my best friend is mixed up with demons, hunters, and angels? And what the hell are you two-" The anger melted away from her face as shock replaced it. "Wait a minute. You're the hunters I'm here to help?" She put her head in her hands. "Great, that's just great. She works hard her whole life to get off the streets and then she gets mixed up with a couple of hunters. Typical."

"Hold on," I snarled. "Little five foot Kara? You're a hunter?"

"Hey!" Kara snapped. "Don't judge me by my size! I could kick your ass!"

"For how long?" Sam asked, gaping at her.

"Since my parents' hearts were ripped out and eaten," she growled, folding her arms. "Now, can we get back to what the hell is going on here?"

Sam and I exchanged glances. "You get home and start working on finding Diana," I told him. "I'll catch her up." Sam nodded and ran out the door.

"Where is he going?" she demanded. "Doesn't he understand that she just died!" The truth of it finally hit her and she squeezed her eyes shut, hanging her head, trying to keep from dissolving into tears. "Oh, God..."

"Hey," I said softly, putting a hand on her shoulder. "It's gonna be okay, I promise."

"She's dead!"

"No, I really don't think she is."

Kara raised her head to look at me with watery eyes. "W-what? What do you mean? I-I saw it. I saw him..."

"I know what you saw," I said, squeezing her shoulder gently. "But, Diana has a force inside of her that isn't going to allow her to die. It's healed her from fatal wounds before, it will do it again. Crowley, the demon, didn't know that. He thinks he's killed her, but he'll be shocked when she wakes up. If we can find her fast enough, catch him by surprise, we might be able to get her back. But, we'll need your help. Can you pull it together to do this? For Diana?"

She nodded, wiping her nose and blinking her tears away. "Of course I can," she insisted. "I'm a hunter."

I offered her a small smile. "C'mon, I'll take you back to our place and explain as best I can on the way." Giving her another shoulder squeeze, I let her lead me out of the barn and to her car. "You know," I said as we walked, "for a shorty, you're not a bad fighter."

"Just don't piss me off," she smirked. I chuckled and got into the passenger's seat.

- Cas' POV -

Her screams rang in my ears no matter where I went. When I returned, she was fairly silent, just breathing heavily, but I could still hear her cries as though they were currently tearing through the air. I dropped the bag of supplies onto the table, beside the various instruments that were coated in blood, dried and fresh. Crowley, wearing a black leather apron over his suit, stroked his chin leisurely as he watched her.

"I didn't expect her to live," he grumbled, then smirked. "But, I'm enjoying myself. My only question is, why is she so weak now?" He removed a bottle of Craig from the bag I'd brought and poured some into a glass.

"The power is exhausted," I informed him. "It has used up a lot of energy holding onto her mind and soul and healing her body so it may retain it's host. You see, if Diana dies, the power is recycled and placed into another body, likely a fetus. The memory of the soul is wiped and it would become dormant again. I have never heard of it becoming so independent before. It's as though it's growing into it's own person now."

"So if we killed her now," Crowley drawled, trailing his finger across the stubble on his chin, "we can harvest the power for ourselves."

"No. If we kill her, we lose the power again. We need her. She is what is keeping it here, within our reach."

Crowley's smile slowly spread across his face, making the hairs on the back of my vessel's neck raise. "Very well," he sighed, standing and bringing himself face to face with the bound, bloodied, and battered girl hanging by her wrists. "I guess we'll just have to draw your pain out some more." Exchanging his liquor for a paper thin blade from his table, he slid it across the girl's exposed abdomen in an L shape, then lifted the corner of skin with two fingers and began to pull. The screams were more terrifying and brain rattling than ever. I had to leave.

- Sam's POV -

Dean, Kara and I had spent two days straight racking our brains for ways to find Diana without causing her more harm. We knew that by now, Crowley had found out about her self-healing. What we didn't know was what was going on inside Diana. After healing a second fatal wound, and likely being tortured, we didn't know if the power would take over the body to escape, or remain dormant, waiting for a time to heal it before running. Unless they'd killed her while she was weak.

No. No, I couldn't think about that. It wasn't possible. The power wouldn't let that happen, it was too attached to Diana and the ability to control the body it was trapped in. It wouldn't let her die.

"I don't understand why we don't just summon Crowley into a Devil's Trap, then torture her location out of him," Kara said, slamming her fist down onto the table.

"Because Castiel is in on it," Dean explained. "If we summon Crowley, Cas will know and probably just move Diana."

"Can't we summon them both?" she asked.

"We can only pray for Cas," I sighed, massaging my temples. "He has the power to ignore us."

"What about that other guy?" Kara suggested, pacing now. "Death. Can't we ask him to help?"

"To do what?" Dean asked, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Reap her soul? That's not exactly the goal, here."

"Well it's been two days!" Kara suddenly screamed. "We need to do something! NOW!"

"Hey!" I yelled. "Don't stand there all high and mighty like you're the only one who cares! We love her, too!"

Kara ran her fingers through her hair, closing her eyes and inhaling deeply. "I know," she sighed. "I know, and I'm sorry. I'm just so frustrated. She was always there to protect me. Always. And now I can't even return that."

"Listen to me, both of you," Dean stood. "We're gonna find her. I swear. We'll find her and we'll bring her home."

"I'm going to hold you to that," Kara threatened.

"Good," Dean nodded. "So am I. Now, we've exhausted all of our first ideas, but maybe we're looking at this the wrong way. Maybe we need to stop thinking about how to approach this as hunters. Maybe we need to think about this as demons or angels."

"Okay, uh, well, demons prefer large rural spaces with a lot of room for blood to pool and very solitary conditions so no one can..." Kara trailed off as she pictured Diana in such a situation.

"Right," I agreed, trying to banish the image myself. "And we know that Crowley likes torturing people who piss him off, so he'll be... busy..."

"But Cas would be pissed if other demons were around, right?" Dean offered. "So, it's gotta be just the two of them. A common ground where they're equals."

"You said they'd partnered up before," Kara interjected. "Did you ever find out where they did their dirty work? Maybe they went back."

"That place was basically burned to the ground," Dean groaned. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Okay, um, a quiet mutual territory where there's a lot of space and no people. Somewhere no one, especially demons and angels, ever goes. Somewhere Diana would be lost even if she did get out. Somewhere that's no where."

A fuzzy image of a map appeared in my head. A map with a Devil's Trap traced onto it, darkening lines that had already been there.

"The gate," I whispered. The others looked up at me. "The gate!"

"The gate to hell?" Dean asked.

"Yes!" I nodded. "It's a giant Devil's Trap! Crowley would be stuck there, but Cas could get in and out and could let him out if it was necessary! No other demons would go, and angels wouldn't be interested! It's a huge open space with nothing but graveyards and fields! I'll bet they're in one of the mausoleums by the gate!"

"Why would they go to a mausoleum?" Kara furrowed her brow.

"Because it's an empty building where they can do what they want," Dean smirked. "Sammy, you're a genius!"

"Wait a minute!" Kara held up her hands to stop us. "Okay, so maybe it makes sense, but what if there's another answer that makes sense and we're charging to an empty stone monument while Diana's suffering on the other side of the country, or world, even!"

"Crowley's a sentimental bastard," Dean told her as I grabbed my coat off a chair. "That gate is the first place Sam and I really became involved directly with hell."

"But that cemetery is not just linked to us, it's linked to Diana, too." I added.

Dean furrowed his brow at me. "How's that?"

"Her parents are buried there."

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