High Noon – chapter 13.

by: sifi.

OOooOO

Slowly she pulled away as Sam pushed Dean back to his feet, the older man dazed and breathless from an overload of sensory input in his tenuous condition.

Inanna looked up into Sam's eyes, "Son," she smiled stroking his cheek then looked back to Dean, "You are a mess... and dying..." she frowned wrapping her arm around his waist and taking his weight unto herself before glancing at Imdugud, "Find a place for him to sit, he has healing that needs to be done," then to Ammit, Shep and Bobby, "Find that part of the cylinders the sword cut through."

She pressed her lips to Dean's once again, "You're poisoned... how?" she asked.

"The guardian... one of its spines caught him before it knew who we are." Sam explained.

She looked up, "Go find it and bring it back with you." She commanded.

"What?"

"The guardian, go find it and bring it back here, we need its help," she watched him glance at Dean whose breath hissed laboriously in and out of his chest.

Sam could hardly believe that a moment ago he'd been running like they were children again. He drew close to his big brother and saw him wince with almost every breath, "Dean?"

The older man nodded, "It knows who you are now... if you can coax it out of hiding it'll come. Use your 'caring and sharing' voice."

"Go Sam, fast! I can fix his arm but that won't save his life."

"We're already in the underworld Laura... pretty much..." he shook his head, for the moment not understanding the significance of their location.

"Exactly... Things exist and can be done here that can't be done on the other side of the veil... now get your ass in gear or my foot's goin' up it!" she ordered, the trembling in her voice giving away the level of her fear as Dean's knees unlocked and he sagged against her.

"Gone," Sam nodded paling at his brother's near collapse before jogging off down the tunnel with his torch held high.

"Bring him here," Imdugud raced back gingerly cradling his king's left side while the woman managed his right. Together they carried him, barely conscious to a boulder up against the wall.

"Found it!" Shep held up the spiral of bronze that had flown off when Nergal shrugged off the bindings from the sword.

"Excellent. Shep you and Ammit start unrolling that... but be careful, don't warp it or let it snap. Bobby get him some water?" Laura ordered then moved to Dean's side.

Bobby held a canteen to the boys' mouth. "Thanks..." he barely grunted, "too bad it's not whiskey."

"You'll really be wishing it was very soon," she warned unlashing the hard leather binding the sidhe had secured around his arm. "Son of a bitch!" she cursed as a saucepan's worth of blood poured out and with it a marquis shaped glut of red covered clay. Even in the darkness the yellow of the bones of his forearm were visible under and through the muscle, tendon and vascular tissues.

"Oh god I'm gonna throw up..." Dean groaned.

"No you're not..." she shook her head.

"Oh yes I am..." he countered swallowing hard as her finger came to the side of his head.

"Sleep." She commanded an instant before his head lolled to the side and his breathing evened out a little bit though the wheezing tightness was still more than a matter of concern.

"Bobby? Any of the flashlights working down here?" She asked.

He shook his head, "Not since we entered the tunnel."

"Oh this is gonna be ugly," she grimaced looking at the faces assembled around them both, "I can fix the arm, but..."

"You need to reduce the breaks," Shep nodded.

"How the hell are you gonna do that? We're not exactly equipped for..." Bobby started.

"Not exactly," she shook her head.

The senior hunter eyed her suspiciously, "What're you gonna do?"

"I can't do it alone... I'm gonna need some help here," she looked at Imdugud, "Did I ever thank you for your protection while I carried Marduk?"

The host shrugged, "It was my pleasure... any opportunity to thwart Lamashtu you know? And he would have been quite the feast for her."

"Ain't that the truth... goes by Lilith now... slippery bitch still has a hard-on for Sam," she smiled, "I'm going to need you to hold his arm taut."

"Can do," he nodded, "Well, provided we all survive this... if they ever face off, give me a call... I'd love to sink my claws into her and feast on her viscera."

"Laura? What the hell are you going to do?" Bobby asked, his voice giving away his anxiety.

"Consider it done," she nodded at the demi-god, then turned her attention back to Bobby, "Mmm... just... really don't ask..." she winced handing the defunct arm to the Assyrian, "Ammit when I get all the fragments out I'm going to need you to keep the tissues where they belong." With a nod the Egyptian unfolded from his host, his natural form, at close inspection nothing like anything any of them had ever seen.

She angled the arm, sliding her fingers under the meat of his muscle, along the track of the two forearm bones. A series of wet sucking, meaty tearing noises had Bobby and Shep turn sharply away as that spear-like tongue shot up through the flesh, its tip holding steady just beneath the skin of Dean's shoulder.

"Eeww..."

"Ungh...my god..."

"Uhh..." they groaned together then had to turn away as she followed the path of the devourer's tongue with her hand.

"I think I can do this without rupturing any of the veins or arteries... did you guys bring any sutures with you?" she asked grunting against the tightness of his musculature, the movement of her fingers inside the young man's skin nauseating to look at. "And get me something clean to lay the bone fragments on... Shep go clean off the clay." She turned her eyes to Bobby, "Get your belt off and make a tourniquet at his shoulder, just in case... but don't cinch it yet."

"Here... this is the best we got..." Shep slid the map made by the tablet's they'd reproduced at Bobby's onto the ground beside her then poured water over the clay and set it on the bronze too.

"Excellent," she gritted her teeth gently sliding the first fragment of bone from within his arm.

OOooOO

Sam turned his head to the side not at all sure what to make of the scene before him. They'd been so far outside the realm of normal for so long that he'd thought nothing could surprise him, he was wrong.

How are we ever going to live normally again? he wondered, taken aback by the idea that the life they'd lived before all this could now seem normal in any way. But it sure beat what he was seeing as he approached the bundle of friends and demons, with a rolling ball of eyes and spiny tentacles at his side as if it was some other worldly dog.

At the creature's approach Ajax whimpered and backed toward the safety of his pack while growling low, his lips pulling back from those gleaming white fangs.

"S'okay Ajax," he muttered and turned feeling the creature retreat until it was half behind him. With his eyebrow spocked high on his forehead and a look on his face that asked, 'Are you shittin' me?' he turned to the guardian, "It's okay, he won't hurt you." then signaled the dog to lay down where he was.

"What the hell...is...going on here..." he asked leaning forward over Laura's shoulder as she worked molding the grayish clay around bits of yellow that set his heart racing in his chest. "Is that..." he asked turning, disbelieving and looking at his big brother who leaned against the wall, his chest rising and falling rhythmically even if the sound was labored.

"It had to be done," Laura muttered then turned to face the creature beside the man who her first son had become, "You poisoned him... fix it!" she demanded pointing at Dean.

Sam couldn't help but notice the quantity of blood that gloved each of her arms stopping just a few inches below the shoulder guards of the leather armor she wore. Swallowing hard he crouched over the bronze she was using as a work table. His eye was caught by Ammit in his true form standing still as a statue with his black iron-like tongue sticking out of his mouth. Sam traced the line of the appendage with his vision noting that it disappeared under the hard leather that had been re-lashed to his brothers' arm.

"Uh..." he started then thought better of it when the crocodilian snout seemed to smile and the bony brow ridges wiggled up and down. "Nevermind... I can see you're ... occupied..."

Beside him the guardian spoke, "I serve the dragon and protect her from those who would do her harm... It is not for me to undo..."

"The dragon is DEAD! and So help me God while you were attacking MY HUSBAND AND SON and their Gallas you let the EXILED son of Enlil slip beyond your ever watchful gaze! Now either you will deliver the cure or I will..." she grasped the sword and swung it in a blurry series of figure 8's moving forward, forcing the creature to retreat, "slice every layer of flesh from your body until I have found the source of it myself... now... what's it gonna be?"

The mass of eyes flicked to Sam who shook his head, "Hell hath no fury man, seriously, you've never seen what she's capable of when she gets like this...it's ugly," he shrugged, "Besides... I want him cured, he's the father of my soul, and my brother... please," he asked crouching on Dean's good side, pressing his hand against the older mans' forehead. He leaned his head down next, placing his ear to his chest, "He's dying... do you really think Tiamat would have wanted the world she created sacrificed for your pride?"

If they didn't know better, and none of them really did, they all would have sworn the guardian seemed to sigh before gliding forward, a long spidery looking 'arm' with a fine glistening point at its tip unfolded from somewhere within the stalked eyes and quivering tentacles and angled toward the sleeping deity. It roamed up and down his torso, seeming to be searching for something then finding what it was looking for, hovered for a split second before bursting into his body just beside his breastbone, right over his heart.

Dean bolted upright, his eyes popped open as he screamed in agony grasping the appendage that sat partly inside his chest.

"Hold him!" Imdugud pressed himself to his king, his main concern to keep the arm still enough for Ammit to keep the place for his bones open.

"Enki..." Laura lurched forward as the spine withdrew in a violent spray of blood. Her hand slapped down over the wound and her eyes blazed murder as the guardian retreated back into the dark tunnels.

"Ina..." he breathed gasping as the blood pressing beneath her hand slowed first to a trickle then ceased altogether and his body settled once more in a semblance of rest. "What the hell just happened?" he asked, for the moment too preoccupied with the pain in his chest to scream about the pain of his boneless arm.

"You need to sleep so we can finish what we've begun," she urged peeking under her hand, relieved and almost disbelieving. The only sign of injury were those with the stitches she'd put in a genuine life ago after he escaped from Nergal's barbed wire wielding lackey.

Quickly his eyes scanned the room, taking in the same peculiar sites that had confounded Sam.

He swallowed hard and nodded looking quite a little green even in the darkness as she returned her finger to the side of his head, "Sleep." she directed with a kiss to his temple.

"Let's finish this," she held up his newly made humerus and looked at Ammit who blinked his assent. She took a moment to double check the shape and size and make sure she was going to be pushing the right end into the sleeve of flesh then took a breath, "Imdugud hold him steady, Shep, hold that lower arm taut, Bobby... keep the upper arm stable... Sam... take off the brace."

OOooOO

Once he returned to the outside he bellowed an inaudibly deep rumble meant to summon his troops while he waited. Turning his head to the right and then the left he inspected the wounds at the base of his wings. Hot blood trickled down his back where the line from that new sword had sliced through his stony flesh as easily as warm animal fat.

Gader'el you will pay dearly...though his skill IS still unsurpassed... So the smith is still alive, as are the devourer and pestilence. How many of the old ones are left? But Enki himself... he is fragile...his pain was delicious... and with his body already broken my task will be easier than I'd anticipated, even without a sword to use against him... he looked at the slanted cut on the roll of bronze in his clawed hand, it is not completely without use... all three of his mouths grinned coldly as he unrolled what was left of the portion of tablets in his possession, Ereshkegal will... well... I have no other choice but to make her do my will.

Slowly, shaking the broken and loosened obsidian feathers from his agonized wings he turned back toward Massacre Rocks and a different entryway into the Underworld as behind him on the highway a car skidded off the road, the disbelieving driver unable to regain control as the car pitched just a little too hard in the runoff ditch and tumbled to a stop behind him.

With a sinister grin on all three mouths he turned back toward the wreckage as the driver pulled himself free and stood staring as the twelve foot tall monster walked toward him. He chuckled to himself as wetness borne of terror spread in a dark pool along the front of the mans' pants.

"You'll do well enough," he placed his hand on the human's head, his talons clamping through his scalp and into his skull, "There is something you can do to serve me." He said and as blood began to run from the human's eyes, planted his will in the man's mind while feasting upon his life energy.

When he was through, the flesh at the base of his wings, though not completely healed was feeling better and had stopped bleeding, and the human servant was running along the ribbon of highway toward fulfillment of his task.

OOooOO

tbc.

Please review.

Thank You.

sifi

A/N – Lamashtu and Pazuzu (another name for Imdugud) were fierce enemies. Though Pazuzu was created to BE evil... and was often charged with creating famine and drought, storms and plagues of locust, he was often called upon by pregnant women as protection against Lamashtu, a demon/demi-goddess who possibly because she had no children of her own, preyed upon pregnant women, stealing the babies from their wombs, sucking on their bones and drinking their blood. Lamashtu was malicious and malevolent for her OWN causes and reasons, whereas most other deities, demi-gods and demons conducted their 'evil' at the direction of the Gods whom they served.

It is also interesting to note that in some cases Lamashtu through the ages has also been identified as Lilitu... later called Lilith. (but she doesn't really figure in my little warverse here so no need for concern... I just figured my fellow SPN addicts might find that wee bit of info... interesting).