"Bobby? It's Jo. I have a name for you. Samael."

He was in the church again. That friggin' church, with all its ghosts and all the whispers.

"Now this is getting beyond a joke."

His words bounced back at him and Dean scowled. Behind him the door began to slowly open, and he tensed, knowing what was to come. He was prepared. It was his dream and he damn well was going to take control of it.

"Hello, Dean."

"Hey, Mrs Potter." He answered her. Eve stood before him, happy to the point of giddiness. Dean winced, and wondered whether he could imagine up a wooden stake or a crossbow. But instead he took a deep breath and looked at the problem rationally, normally not one of his fortes.

"Can you tell me what all this is about? This crazy dream with the church and stuff?"

"Yes."

For a moment Dean was speechless. "Wow. Really? 'Cause I kind of wasn't expecting an answer to that."

She smiled innocently, hands clasped behind her back. "There are more than just you inside your mind." She replied cryptically, and Dean swallowed hard, horrified.

"You're saying that there are other people messing around inside my head?" He demanded. "But that's impossible! I'm protected against possession."

"This isn't possession." Suddenly she was painfully close, and she arched herself up at him. "This is suggestion." She whispered by his ear.

"Well then, I suggest you get out of my dream." He snarled at her. "Piss of back to wherever you came from and leave me the hell alone."

"Ooh, so big and bad." The succubus purred. "Puppy wants to play. I can play too."

Lightning flashes, and then Eve was gone. Dean found himself standing in the middle of someone's backyard, a huge and derelict manor house towering over him. A swing set was rocking lazily from side to side, and the once-glorious garden was overgrown with weeds.

"Welcome to my home."

The well-rounded, polished vowels. The accent. Dean knew who it was before he even turned around. She was sitting on one of the swings, slowly rocking backwards and forwards, her dark hair over her eyes.

"Of course, it was much nicer when there were still people living in it."

"Bela."

"I was Abby here." She said. "I hated being Abby, with the starving and the beatings and the rest. I was a little girl. How could my parents have done those things? They were supposed to protect me."

Despite himself, Dean felt himself feeling just a little sorry for the British hell-whore. "Bela." She looked up at him.

Her eyes were black.

"I am stuck here because this is my Hell." She said. "Do you remember your Hell?"

Dean closed his eyes against the monsters and the darkness. Turned his back on the horrors and forced them from his mind. "What are you trying to tell me?" He asked her. "What are you all trying to tell me?"

"The road to Hell is paved with good intentions." The Bela-demon said. Then she smiled.

"But what does that even mean?!" Dean demanded.

She stood. "Come with me."

Reluctantly he followed her to the back doors of the mansion, and slowly they creaked open. "Do you see?"

He squinted, craning his neck. "I don't see anything."

"Exactly." The Bela-demon said, then ferociously pushed him through the doors.

Swallowed by blackness.

Through the rabbit hole, Alice! I think I see the March Hare and the Mad Hatter!

The house was even bigger on the inside, dark and ominous. Air whistled around him, in and out, almost as if the very building was breathing.

Get a grip.

"And tonight we're playing the demonic version of This Is Your Life." Dean muttered. "Who will be the special guest star to surprise our unwitting victim?" He opened the door to his right.

It swung out into nothing. There should have been a whole world beyond that door, but there was nothing. Only a vast wasteland, rubble heaped to the sky, the sickly sweet smell of decay in his nostrils. Dean stepped back inside Bela's house, a hand over his mouth and nose. "Good grief!"

Somewhere something roared. And not a little, ouch-I-stubbed-my-toe roar, a full blown bellow. From something very big. And probably very mean. And likely with very big teeth and claws. Mutant creatures scuttled across the ground, bloody meat dangling from their jaws.

One of them had a child's doll in its mouth.

"This is our Eden." Sam said. "This is our paradise. And you are not welcome."

Searing pain. Dean screamed.

"The road to Hell is paved with good intentions." Bela said.

"Puppy wants to play." Eve jeered.

"We all thought you were strong enough to do it." Sam said, golden eyes burning right through his brother. "I guess we were wrong."

Then the other man was there, holding a flaming sword. Wings. The man had friggin' wings! Castiel! I remember you. Slowly he raised the sword above his head. "One life for the good of the many." He whispered. "Forgive me."

The blade came down…

…Dean snapped awake, almost falling out of bed. He was drenched in a cold sweat and he could hear his heart practically beating out of his chest. He willed himself to calm down, for his hands to stop shaking.

There was a knock on the door.

"What?" Dean snapped.

"Thought you'd like some caffeine." His little brother stuck his head around the door. Sammy Winchester, not demonic, not evil, just some guy with a serious case of bed head bearing two cups of coffee. "Dude, you okay?" He asked.

"Why wouldn't I be okay? Just another restful night of sleep."

Sam gave him a stern look, a look that clearly said he wasn't buying it.

"What?"

"You were talking in your sleep. Well, screaming, really. I could hear it right through the wall."

Dean stiffened. "What did you hear?"

"Um, you were talking about a Eden." Sam answered, confused. "A Black Eden? Is that some sort of band or something?"

Dean ignored his lame attempt at a joke. Sam cautiously entered the room, setting down a coffee on the chest of drawers. Too cautiously. "What else did I say?"

"You said-" Sam sighed, his expression pained. He took a breath and began again. "You said 'Sam, don't kill me'."

The brothers were silent. "Thanks for the coffee." Dean finally said.

"No problem."

"Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"Let's not talk about this, ever again."

Wordlessly Sam left the room. Dean dropped his head into his hands. It couldn't go on like this for much longer.

Finally emerging from the bedroom, he showered, shaved, and went down to join everyone for breakfast.

Garth was in his morning-before-school-and-I-haven't-done-homework rush while Monty was still in her dressing gown and Lawson was already up and ready in his dark suit, reading the paper. Dean spotted Sam standing a little impatiently in front of the waffle machine, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

Dean helped himself to a little toast, and Lawson gravely informed him how he had organised a meeting with Laura Walsh, The Don's daughter, later in the day. And although he agreed he'd be sacrificing his job, he would get the Winchester brothers past security and into the crime scene, provided that they don't do anything to possibly hinder the investigation. After all, he was still a forensic scientist, and this was still his gig.

Sam and Dean were aware that they would have to be extremely careful not to step on anyone's toes here.

Laura was the only one currently based at the Walsh family home while the investigation was ongoing, as her mother had gone up the coast with one of her older sisters, but it was Laura herself that the brothers really wanted to talk to. Laura, the harmless young woman who had an overwhelming feeling that there had been foul play in her father's death.

She was waiting for them at her father's offices on the military college. Lawson had got the brothers past by claiming they were colleagues of his. "You must be Sam and Dean."

"Yes, ma'am. And you must be Laura."

"Dexter and Lawson told me about you."

"Never mind him. We're actually nice people." Dean said. He shook her hand. She appeared dainty, almost petite, with her mousy brown hair and high cheekbones, but her grip was firm. She was a Marine's daughter and it showed in her eyes.

Sam shook her hand and introduced himself as Dean cast an appraising eye across the college grounds.

"Your father taught here?"

"Sometimes. When he wasn't in Washington, DC." She said. "This is where they… found him."

That became apparent when Sam spotted the yellow crime tape and the men and women in dark jumpsuits with NCIS written across them. He knew it would be a potentially fatal gamble to try to fool the agents when every one of them were armed, but there really was no choice. The NCIS were looking for the human murderer of a marine; Sam and his brother were after something worse.

Lawson and Laura begged time away with the three field agents, allowing the Winchesters to sneak into Donnie Walsh's office.

Once inside the office, Sam immediately looked up to the ceiling. The evil eye inside the pyramid glared back down at him. Something about the symbol didn't sit right with him.

"Getting any divine insight, maestro?" Dean asked. He stood beside his brother and also stared up. "What's on your mind?"

"Well, for one, did you know there is actually no such thing as the evil eye?" Sam answered. "There are heaps of incantations and amulets and stuff you can use to 'ward off' the Evil Eye, but it doesn't actually exist."

"The evil eye?"

"No." Sam said. He pointed up. "That is the All Seeing Eye."

"Wow." Dean paused. "What a terrible job."

"The All-seeing Eye has been a benevolent symbol for centuries."

"So how did it suddenly morph into the evil eye?"

"I'd say it was another present from the Catholic Church, like when they built their own holy spots on pagan hallowed ground and turned the pagan gods into devils." Sam said. "It just was adapted to the attitudes of the time. Like how the swastika was really once a symbol of harmony, but Hitler reversed the image and used it in the Nazi campaign in World War Two."

"Or like the inverted cross. The upside down pentagram." Dean added.

Sam noticed a foreign inscription along the three sides of the pyramid, and he quickly scribbled them down in his notebook. "Yes. I suppose it was viewed as turning these beliefs on their heads. The eye was never really evil, but it could focus power like a bifocal focuses the sun. Incorporating the Eye into your spellwork could, in theory, make you, um, perform better."

"Kind of like Viagra." Dean replied. "Hey, check this out." Sam looked down. Dean had abandoned his side and was looking about on the floor.

"What have you got?"

Dean rubbed some of the powdery substance on his fingers. "It's ash." He took out a little exhibit bag he had taken from Lawson's suitcase and swept a little inside.

"Maybe he had a smoke."

"I don't think so." Dean held up a charred fragment that he had found in the ash. It was a tooth.

Someone's gold tooth.

"Sammy," He said gravely. "These are human remains. I think someone was trying to use Donnie as a human sacrifice, only our Marine beat him to the punch."

"A human sacrifice for what?"

But Dean was already hauling back the large square of carpet on the floor. A horned beast inside an inverted pentagram glared back at him.

"Hell." He cussed quietly. "Someone's been messing around with some heavy mojo."

"I've found references that call Samael both the 'tempting angel' and the 'dark angel of death'."

"So he's an angel?"

"If you go by the lore, he's pretty much the prototype of every fallen angel story since Man fell out of the trees. I've found documents stating that this guy was the one that tempted Lucifer and caused him to be banished from the Heavenly Host." Bobby replied.

"The problem is, references to him are short on the ground. This guy, this Samael, he disappeared thousands of years ago, and all knowledge of him just sort of died out. No one was ever quite sure where he went, either."

"That has to mean that he isn't that dangerous, right? If we haven't heard from him that long?" Jo demanded.

"Wrong." The older man said gravely. "The fact that he's been missing for all that time means we know next to nothing about him. And if he's coming back, then we don't have any clue of how to fight him." He didn't sound too thrilled about the prospect.

"So we've got basically bubkiss?" Jo asked wearily, leaning back in the chair she was perched on.

"Depends on where you dig." The hunter said evasively.

"Bobby?"

He took a breath. "Samael is highly revered as one half of the sacred union of the Church of Satan. In fact, the horned symbol of the Church is the Seal of Samael."

Jo pulled in a breath. The Church of Satan was basically a religious order for those who believed in things other people didn't, but it still wasn't a good sign. "Who's the other half of the sacred union?" She asked cautiously.

"Lilith." He said. "I've found references to a ritual that will open the door for Samael, using blood and ashes, as apparently 'as Man was created of clay and bone, so Samael is brought about by blood and ashes'. It can only be used at the anniversary of the demon's banishment, and a sacrifice of comparable power needs to be presented to him so he can consume it and absorb it." Bobby continued. "At the coming of the Black Eden, the sacrifice is said to present itself."

"Do you have anything else?"

"Ah… Yes and no." Bobby said.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"Are you a religious person, Jo?"

That stopped her. "I suppose I've never thought of it." She said with some surprise. "I guess it depends on the season."

"I've got references from Kabbalah, The Alpha Betha of Ben Sira, the Bible, all over the world that mention that there may have been two beings created by God, or whatever He likes to call himself, before Adam and Eve. Sort of like drafts before the final work." He said.

"Let me guess. Samael and Lilith." Jo said darkly.

"The dark doubles of the first humans." Bobby said. "They rebelled against God and the angels before creating their own place among the demons. In time I suppose they became demons."

"But what happened to make Samael disappear? Did you get any reference to why he wants to come back so bad?"

"Revenge, most like."

"What?"

"It was Lilith." Bobby said. "Lilith was afraid of how powerful Samael was becoming, so she gathered her followers and – well, you can guess the rest."

"What about the Black Eden? Any theories?"

"From what I've picked up, this Black Eden that everyone is talking about is a precursor of the coming of Samael." Bobby said. "It's not a demon, or any sort of monster that I can make out. I'm going out on a limb here, but I believe that in the same way that Samael and Lilith are the doppelgangers of Adam and Eve, the Black Eden is the direct opposite of the Garden of Eden."

"Excuse me?"

"The Garden of Eden, girl! What was the Garden of Eden?" Bobby demanded. Jo swallowed. It had been a long time since she had gone to Sunday school.

"Paradise?" She said uncertainly.

"Creation." Bobby said. "And the opposite of creation is-"

There were footsteps outside the door. "I've got to go." Jo whispered hastily.

"Where are you?" The older man demanded. "One of the boys found your car wrecked at the side of the highway. We all thought-"

"I'm fine. But I can't… tell you where I am." Jo hated it. She hated having to withhold the truth from the people dearest to her. "I just can't."

"But you're safe?"

"I'm fine. I sort of ran into these three guys. They don't seem to be demons; actually they're more like the TV evangelists from hell. They asked me to hang around for a while." Jo frowned, feeling squeamish, uncertainty forming a canker in her stomach. "…and I just went with them. Just like that. I don't even know who they are. I don't know - God, what is wrong with me?"

"The important thing is not to panic." Bobby said. "What you need to do-"

The door opened and Jo snapped her phone shut. Sariel was standing in the doorway, his tall form blocking the light, his dark glower even more livid than before. He stepped into the room.

"Castiel has an unusual taste in pets." He said. "But this is one mongrel he won't be taking home."