Daniel, Anne and David had been Dean's creation. Marcus was pretty sure that neither of them existed. He had checked; none of the other hunters had ever heard of them, their names weren't registered anywhere.
They were also, by Marcus' design, the first ones to die in the basement of the Vatican Museum archives. Red shirts, as far as he was concerned; side characters that Marcus hadn't really paid that much attention to, because really, they didn't matter.
For whatever reason Dean had conjured them up, one more level of protection that he seemed to gather around himself like a collector of rare things. They were nothing but distractions in what was to come.
Raphael, one of the angels that had ignored Marcus summoning ritual, appeared on cue in the millionaire's make-believe land. He would be the match that would light the fuse.
The same as with the three hunters, Marcus had had no hand in Dean's paralysis; that had been of Dean's own making as well. It was as if, somehow, the hunter could sense that he was trapped, that his freedom had been taken away from him. Or maybe he was truly punishing himself for Lisa's 'death'; Marcus had no interest in it either way.
The electric jolts were a whole different matter; as one of the scientists had explained it to him, they were a direct result from the fiber optic feed linked directly to Dean's spine and the brain's resistance to what it saw as an assault. Every time new information was fed into his mind, Dean felt it, rebelled against it and expressed itself in the only way it knew of: pain.
Fascinating as it was, Marcus had feared that the paralysis would somehow hinder his efforts to have Dean there as Ben died. In the end, it too had worked to his advantage.
When Dean opened his eyes again, he knew that not much time had passed. Instead of the silence of before, he could hear screaming.
Looking at the downward spiraling stairs and his upturned wheelchair, Dean bit down the angry cry of frustration that was climbing up his throat. More than the fact that he had no weapons to fight an archangel, it was the fact that he couldn't even get to where the fight was happening that pissed Dean off.
Dragging himself across the floor until he was facing the first step, Dean peered down. "Ben?"
More screaming answered him, joined by the pointless boom of a weapon going off in closed quarters, the unmistakable sound of a body hitting a hard surface. The noise wasn't coming from very far. Dean figured that there was only one flight or two of stairs keeping him from his son. And one way or the other, Dean was going to get to the bottom of those steps and help Ben.
He dragged himself a couple of inches further, thanking the heavens for the fact that Raphael hadn't simply wiped out the sigil Dean had been working on, more invested in getting his hands on that artifact than concerning himself with invalid hunters.
One last hurried squiggle and Dean pressed his blood covered hand against the center of the drawing.
Below, the screams came to an abrupt stop as night turned into day. An eerie silence followed.
"Ben? Answer me, Ben!"
Hearing nothing, no answering call, no groan of life, Dean started moving. Dragging his lifeless legs in front of him, he sat on the first step. The view from there was dizzying, steep steps curling inwards and disappearing into the dark. Dean swallowed against the vertigo.
Using the strength of his arms alone, Dean started sliding down the steps two at a time, ignoring the pain as his butt hit the steps in bumps.
He was actually making good progress when a scream that he recognized all too well rose from below. "Ben!" he shouted. Concentration lost, his hand slipped. For one standstill moment, Dean believed that he would be able to compensate, that he would be able to grab hold of the stair's metal railing. But the dead weight of his legs dragged him down too fast, doubling the pull of gravity.
Off balance, Dean fell in an uncontrollable tumble, arms instinctively curled around his head, trying to protect himself from the worst. Unable to tuck his legs in, the way his father had taught him so many years ago, Dean was helpless to stop the long limbs from flailing aimlessly against wall and railing and air and steps. It served only to somewhat slow down his descent.
The fall seemed to last forever, impossibly long. When it finally stopped and Dean could at last feel solid ground underneath him, he took a few moments for his vision to clear and his heart catch up to the fact that the world was no longer spinning wildly around him.
Dean tried to figure out how many bones he'd broken, see if he could move without passing out. To his surprise, he felt relatively fine. His arms hurt, and he was sure that a couple of fingers in his left hand were broken and his head felt hollow and achy, but he had expected worse.
All of that lost importance the second the smell of blood registered.
There was no sign of David, Anne or Daniel. However, the fact that their clothes were lying on top of distinct puddles of gooey blood, left little room for optimism. Dead. All three of them. Because of him.
"BEN!" Dean called at the top of his lungs. He could barely breathe, thinking that the next pile of bloody clothes his eyes would find would be... "BEN!"
Dean looked around frantically, trying to cover every inch of the large room in one glance.
Everything was destroyed and laid in ruins. It was impossible for anyone to have survived that.
He'd been too slow in finishing the sigil, too damn slow in casting those angels away in time of saving anyone. He had failed, Dean's mind kept telling him over and over again. There was no way Ben was still alive. He had failed.
Dean dragged his body over the bloody floor, barely taking notice of the upturned shelves and the ancient books scattered around. The palms of his hands crushed pieces of glass and ceramics as he moved forward, shards claiming place in his palms without Dean even registering the fact. There were fragments of stone statues and bent metal sculptures everywhere he looked.
His legs caught on something, stopping his progress and Dean looked back.
He stared, detachedly, at the piece of bone sticking out from his leg. The white fragment had pierced right through his clothing, peeking out like a submarine's periscope. The jeans, already soaked in the blood of others, had no more room for Dean's, even though he was sure that he had to be bleeding. He hadn't felt a thing.
Tugging the leg free only made the piece of bone change its angle, something that Dean sure would have him passing out from the pain alone, if he had any feeling below his thighs.
Dean moved forward. Until he found Ben alive and okay, he couldn't give a damn about broken bones or bleeding. If Ben was dead, none of it would matter anyway.
Seconds later, eyes still scanning the room, hazy in the dust from pulverized plaster and old books, he found Ben. The kid was on the floor, almost hidden behind a broken bust, the statue's face so large that the nose alone was about the size of Dean's arm. "BEN!"
There was no answer and Dean had no choice but to drag himself the rest of the way until he could touch the boy. His boy.
There was blood on Ben's clothes, Dean had seen that much from afar, but without touching him it was impossible to know how much of that sea of red was Ben's and how much was due to the lives that had been lost around him.
Arms trembling from the strain he was putting on them, Dean leaned against what was left of the statue and pulled Ben towards him. The kid's eyes were closed, his face a mask of pain. "Ben... come on... don't do this to me," he begged, not caring how broken he sounded. "Not you too."
Images of past losses jumbled themselves in Dean's mind; moments of terror and heartbreak playing like small videos in his mind's eye. His father, flat lining on a hospital bed; Sam, bleeding out in his arms on a cold, rainy night in a ghost town. And Lisa, broken and ripped to shreds in a dark warehouse...
Dean blinked. Lisa had died inside a car; their car.
Ben was still alive. Dean could feel his breath, ragged and faint, puffing against Dean's neck; he could feel Ben's heart beating, fast as a sparrow's, underneath the fingers that Dean had pressed against Ben's pulse.
Ben was alive, but Ben was dying. The gash cut across his belly was deep and large enough that Dean could see the kid's guts trying to spill out. Dean had no fingers left to try and push them back in; he couldn't let go of Ben's pulse and he couldn't stop caressing the boy's face, willing him to open his eyes and tell Dean that he was okay, that this was all make-believe. "Come on, Ben... don't do this to me... come one."
The only sound to come out of Ben's mouth, however, was a pained moan; it cut deeply into Dean's heart. "Dad..."
"I'm here, Ben," Dean said, his treacherous voice breaking on him. "I'm right here... not gonna leave you, son."
Out of despair, Dean looked at his cell phone one more time; they were too deep underground for him to get any reception, he already knew that. His hope for a different outcome this time around was crushed when he saw the phone's screen, still looking for an operator.
There was no one else around, no one within shouting distance. And Dean was useless, unable to just pick Ben up and take him to help.
Dean's vision grayed and suddenly he could feel Lisa's body, curled against his chest, hot blood soaking his shirt and making it stick to his skin. But he was running; he was running to save her.
Dean screamed, confused and angry at the images popping into his head, memories of events that he was sure had never happened. He screamed because Ben was dying in his arms and there was nothing that Dean could do to save him.
"Cass..." Dean whispered, more a sobbed sound than a voiced word. "Cass, if you're still out there... somewhere," he went on, swallowing his tears. "Plea- please-"
His throat closed before Dean could say the rest, before he could beg the angel to come to him. Castiel was gone, hiding from Raphael. Dead. There was no one left to answer Dean's call.
In his arms, Dean could feel the exact moment Ben stopped breathing. It was then, when grief threatened to blind him, that Dean saw the bright white light.
Dean's pain for not being able to save Ben was like a warm blanket, curling around Marcus like it was a physical thing. The hunter was crying openly now and Marcus could feel every one of the tears shed for Ben -for him- as if they were real.
The dream had seemed so real and solid that Marcus felt slightly disorientated when he was pulled back from it and into reality. One look around, however, was enough for him to center himself.
It was time.
He gave Dean one quick look, fascinated to see that, like in the dream, this Dean had tears escaping the corners of his closed eyes. The mind experienced and the body felt.
Marcus' attention went from Dean's still form to what was happening on the computer screens. It was like watching a virtual reality world. A life simulation, only with real people.
In one screen, there were a myriad of jumbled lines of varying colors, waving up and down at the rhythm of his thoughts: Dean's brain waves. In the screen next to it, a continuous stream of gibberish that made even less sense to Marcus, but one that he had been assured to be complex computer programming coding. It was there that they could insert any changes in the dream that Marcus decided. Their 'script', so to speak.
But it was the last screen that Marcus was interested in. It was the screen where brain waves and computer coding merged and translated into image; it was where they could see and record what Dean was experiencing.
Dean was looking at the dead figure of Ben in his arms through a veil of tears. His heart rate was galloping into dangerous numbers and his blood pressure was through the roof. Dean's physical well being, however, was the least of their concerns.
"Any minute now..." Marcus whispered, checking if the man in charge of the recording was ready and alert.
The man's finger pressed the right button even before any of them started to hear the words.
"Cass... Cass, if you're still out there... somewhere. Plea- please-"
The colorful lines on Dean's brain activity went fuzzy for a few seconds and Marcus knew that, right then, they had gotten what he needed.
"Got it sir," the tech said, sounding pleased with his performance. "We have a clear neural transmission that should work fine when broadcast."
Marcus smiled. Everything was finally lining up.
The older hunter exchanged a look with Sam as he hung off the phone. "It's set," he said gravely.
"'I want in'?" Sam couldn't help to parrot, a sneer in his lips. "'I want in'? What are you? Al Capone?"
"He's not even bothering to hide what he knows about me anymore," Bobby said, pulling his cap off to scrub his head. "He came right out and 'fessed up to the fact that he knew about my involvement in the whole angel confusion... I improvised."
"You ripped off 'The Godfather', that's what you did," Sam added with a pat on the other man's shoulder. "Dean would be proud."
Bobby shrugged away, some of tension left behind by talking to Marcus ebbing away at Sam's shenanigans. "Shuddup, you id'jit."
His eyes traveling beyond the tall Winchester, Bobby gazed at the figure currently raiding his fridge for cheese. "You sure this will work?"
"My dear man," Balthazar started, straightening up with the spoils of his hunt trapped between two fingers. "Have I ever let any of you down?" Noting the less than trusting looks that the two hunters were throwing his way, the angel took a bite of his cheese, barely hiding his smirk. "Well... yes, I have. I'm aware of that," he said with his mouth full. "But I had to sweat my nuts off to get my hands on that bloody thing. Castiel doesn't really share his toys these days, you know? So, give me some credit here... I'll do my best tomorrow."
And with that he was gone.
Sitting heavily against the kitchen counter, Sam looked at Bobby from beneath long, shaggy bangs. This sucked, and they both knew it well. The entirety of their plan banked too much on a lot of 'what ifs' and too many unknowns. All it would take was someone making a mistake, someone looking in to their actions too deeply, or Balthazar screwing them over and they would be... well, screwed.
Bobby turned the rusty spike, trapped between the pincers in his hands. He had learned the hard way that holding the damn thing with unprotected fingers hurt as hell. He even had the blisters to prove it.
It didn't look like much. Old, but certainly not with the power to command armies into victory. It was just an aged, rusted piece of iron. That burned on contact. "You think he brought us the real thing?" he wondered out loud. Not that his reaction when touching the thing hadn't been impressive and all, but Bobby had been around for too long to be impressed by so little.
"I hope so," Sam said, walking to Bobby side and picking up the old nail. Before Bobby could issue a warning, Sam's fingers had brushed against it. Bare skin on iron.
Bobby flinched, waiting to smell burned skin.
The tingling feeling that cursed through the tip of his fingers when Sam grabbed the Nail made him doubt his own words. It could be just the power of suggestion, he told himself. Or, more likely, hunger. He couldn't really remember the last time he'd eaten. What it didn't do was burn his fingers like it had done to Bobby.
Sam looked at the older hunter, confused.
"Hey, don't look at me," Bobby said, holding his palms up in surrender. "I ain't touching the damn thing again to make sure... let Marcus himself solve this tie."
"We can only assume that he'll have some way of testing it before trying it," Sam went on, dropping the matter. "Make sure that we didn't just pick it up at Wal-mart. Besides, Balthazar seemed pretty sure that the thing didn't do what Marcus believes it to do. If it's able to control anyone, to lead armies into battle, it isn't angels, or Heaven's armies anyway... wouldn't want to test it on humans though."
Sam sat the Nail back on the table and wiped his hands on his jeans. "Either way, we need to make sure that Marcus doesn't get to keep this when we're done."
The plan was simple enough, for all that was involved.
Bobby would go to Marcus to deliver the Holy Nail while Sam sneaked his way into the top floor of the millionaire's house and free Dean.
Meanwhile, Bobby would stick around while Marcus summoned himself an angel; Balthazar would answer the call, pretending to be under Marcus control until Sam, Dean and Bobby made their exit.
A simple in and out. No sweat.
Things in real life, however, never worked quite like that. There was the not-so-small matter of Sam getting inside a heavily guarded perimeter that had more security cameras than most prisons. Also, there was the matter of getting past all the guards that Sam had seen posted at the front and back entry andat every access point inside the house and his brother's room... all without raising the alarm. And most importantly, there was the matter of Dean himself.
After more than a week in the hands of that man, there was no telling what condition Dean would be in. Sam had only seen a pair of legs, but the room itself had left him little hope of finding Dean unscathed. It was, after all, Dean they were talking about.
Even if Marcus had the best intentions towards the oldest Winchester, Sam knew his brother. He was a pro at getting his captors pissed off.
"What I'd like to know is how the hell this Marcus fella managed to angel-proof his entire place," Bobby mused out loud. "It's not like any of the other hunters had access to that particular piece of information. Do you think Balthazar was lying about that?"
Sam shook his head. Even his hair felt tired just thinking about all they needed to do still. "The risk is much greater staying in the open and facing Marcus as he has offered to do," he pointed out. "Balthazar protects his own ass above all else. If he truly had a way of zapping in and out of Marcus' mansion undetected, he would use it. Besides," Sam added, sadly. "Marcus has access to the most reliable source of information on angels to get the angel proofing right."
"Dean," Bobby finished, the same sad expression in his face. Fat lot of good it had done the older Winchester. All that angels had brought him was pain and heartache. "We'll get him out, Sam," the older man said, sounding like he was trying to convince himself as well. "And that son of a bitch will get his just desserts."
When Dean opened his eyes, he was all alone. The warmth of Ben's body, which he had been grasping close to his, was gone. It felt like a piece of him was missing.
"Ben?" Dean called out, frantically searching with his eyes, even if it was too dark to see. The emptiness of the room returned his voice, void of answer. Maybe he'd been dreaming. Or having one of those weird spells; perhaps he wasn't even there at all…
Dean fumbled through his pockets, searching for a lighter. His hands shook when he finally held one and flicked it open. The light from the tiny flame did little more than deepen the crimson puddle on the floor, a reminder of the many who had died there. But Dean's heart could only fear for the life of one of them…
"BEN!" he shouted again, holding on to the faint hope that maybe Ben had gotten better and wandered away. It was a fool's hope, one no more solid than wisps of clouds.
"There is no point in calling the boy," a somber voice replied. "Ben is no longer Ben. He is Anniel now."
Dean's hand slipped on the blood soaked floor as he tried to turn too fast and meet the person speaking. Helpless to prevent the fall, the side of his face struck the concrete, sending a jolt of pain across his skull. Humiliated and with the blood of others dripping from his face, Dean didn't even bothered looking up to meet the angel's eyes. "What are you doing here? I thought you were dead."
He was angry, distraught and in pain, and Castiel… was too late.
There was a momentary pause as Castiel tilted his head, a gesture so familiar and yet so unsettlingly human that it sent a shiver through Dean's soul. "You called for me. I came."
"I called you…" Dean began evenly, turning his head to look up at the angel, "…to save Ben!" he spat loudly, anger and anguish flashing in his eyes. "Just like I called you to save Lisa and you... never answered. What are you doing here now?"
"Ben is safe. Anniel is a good fighter, he will take good care of the boy," Castiel went on, unwavering under Dean's rage. "And Lisa… she's at rest, you need not worry about her fate."
"That's bull!" Dean hissed, angry at the tears gathering in his eyes. He had failed them all, screwed up at every turn and chance of keeping them safe. Sam, Lisa, Ben… "Ben was dead! He never gave his consent to be an angel condom!"
"The soul is immortal, Dean," Castiel said in a condescending tone. "You, better than anyone, should know that. What Ben refused in life, to obey you, his soul accepted with no hesitation."
Dean shook his head. "No…" he couldn't force himself to believe that. He couldn't even imagine Ben out there, fighting battles that were not his to fight, facing death over and over again. "NO! You bring him back right now, or I swear to God I'll—"
"You'll do what?" Castiel pressed on, crouching to get closer to Dean. The hem of his ever present trench coat was slowly soaking the redness out of the floor. "There is nothing you can do… you're just a man, Dean."
The same odd feeling of before took over Dean. This was not the first time he had heard those words coming from Castiel's lips. It was more than a sense of déjà vu; it felt almost as a second life that Dean couldn't remember living.
"Let Ben go, Dean…" Castiel continued, leaning forward and placing a placating hand over the brand on Dean's shoulder. The bran he'd made. "He never belonged to you."
Dean wanted to shrug off the touch, wanted to be stubborn and proud, but there was nothing left to be proud about. Ben was all he'd had left and now, he had nothing. He was nothing.
When Lisa died and Dean had been left with a sense of guilt so profound and consuming that it was he could think of, Ben had been there to keep him sane.
When he was forced to accept the reality that he was paralyzed and would never walk again in his life, Ben was there to keep Dean from drowning in self-pity.
Now, Dean was trapped. Utterly alone with his guilt, with his limitations, with his emptiness.
The tears that Dean had been fighting since Ben's death –hell!- since Lisa's death, fell freely now. Years of built up pain spilled from his eyes and his chest heaved painfully in attempt to let it all out. The anguish crowding his chest, desperate to be free from his very soul, flooding the room like a broken damn. He had lost so much, given so much…
This was all he had now, Dean realized as he lay there, in a dark basement half way across the world, soaked in the blood of his friends and his son, being lectured by the angel that he had once considered a friend, a brother even, but who had done nothing to help those Dean loved. "What am I supposed to do now?" Dean asked, his voice broken with sobs that he could no longer contain. "What am I supposed to do?"
"Now, it's time you die, Dean Winchester."
There was a faint flutter of wings and then Sam was alone. He looked around and then down, sucking in a breath, his eyes closing in reflex.
Looking down had been a bad idea. That whole plan was a bad idea.
Sam took a deep breath and tried again. Dean might be the one with a thing about airplanes, but Sam hated heights.
And the rooftop of Marcus' house was high. And windy.
Balthazar hadn't stuck around after leaving him on the rooftop, on the west end of the house, as far away as possible from the watchful guards posted at the front gate. The angel had other places he needed to be.
In part, Sam was just glad that they had managed to land at all.
This particular part of their plan had rested heavily on the assumption that the Enochian sigils preventing the angel from going inside the house would not prevent him from landing on the roof with Sam. The thought that, as an alternative, the angel would have to just drop Sam down made nasty things happen to Sam's already churning stomach.
So far, so good though. Except for the part where Sam was still on the roof and looking for a way in. His best bet seemed to be a small window, more of an attic dormer, close to the top of the tower.
Praying that the ledge of ornamented clay would continue to bear his weight, Sam inched forward, slowly toward the small window. Below, he imagined that Bobby would be about to knock on Marcus' front door with the Holy Nail, which gave Sam about half an hour to get to Dean, get him out and meet Bobby at the rendezvous point. Piece of cake.
Grabbing hold of the window with one hand, Sam tested it, hoping that it wasn't locked. The frame rose up smoothly and Sam sighed in relief.
Looking inside, he was pleased to see that the place was used more for storage than anything else. A common attic, because apparently, even bad guys had junk to store.
The window frame itself was a tight fit, but Sam managed to squeeze in, landing on his hands with a muffled groan and a cloud of dust.
Glad to finally have solid ground under his feet, Sam pulled out the gun he had stuck at the back of his jeans and carefully turned the knob on the door. There was a short corridor right in front of the door and what looked like a small flight of stairs down to the main part of the house. At the end of the stairs, Sam could glimpse the shoulder of one of the guards.
Sam checked his watch again. He was on time.
Careful to make his steps as silent as possible, Sam neared the edge of the steps and took aim.
The gun was part of a new stash that, apparently, Dean and soulless-him had been forced to acquire during their short time working for Crowley. Though Dean never talked much about that period -usually only to disperse generous amounts of swearing and cursing at the demon- Sam had gathered that, in order to deliver the alpha-monsters that Crowley had demanded in exchange for Sam's soul, they had taken to using several types of stun guns.
Which now came in handy. Sam pressed the trigger, watching the small dart bury itself on the man's neck, and ran as fast as he could down the steps, catching the falling guard at the last second.
One down, a gazillion to go.
Bobby walked through the silver gates that gave access to Marcus' property for the second time in less than a week.
While the first time had been filled with doubt and a sense of wasted time, now he strode forward filled with nervous purpose.
They knew where Dean was and they would get him out. Of that, Bobby had no doubts.
A man wearing a white jacket came to open the door after Bobby's third ring. Watching another of Marcus' employees who probably knew nothing about whom his boss really was, the hunter couldn't help but think about that young woman that Marcus had murdered in cold blood because she's been in the wrong place at the wrong time, thanks to him and Sam.
Pushing the thought aside, Bobby stood silently as the man waved an electric device around his arms and legs. A portable X-ray machine, Bobby remembered from the first time he'd been there, meant to detect any hidden weapons on his person.
"This way," the butler said curtly once he was satisfied that Bobby was unarmed. He led him through an impossibly long corridor until they reached the other side of the house. To their left, there was large hall with a staircase spiraling up. To their right, a set of double doors gave way to a spacious room dominated by a long white wall. A round, gaming table covered in red felt and a matching pool table stood in the middle; a few chairs, that looked like no one had ever sat on them, were perfectly aligned at the back of the room in front of a large painting of hunting dogs.
The butler kept on walking, nearing the white wall and reaching out to touch a small button on the right side of the large, empty wall. Bobby watched as the white wall shimmered and turned clear as crystal, allowing him a view to an outside patio. Only them did the man led Bobby through the sliding glass door and outside.
Under a glowing sun, sitting by a iron table and surrounded by well-tended, sculpted bushes, was Marcus.
"Mr. Singer," the other man greeted him with a smile. "I have to say… your phone call made my day. Can I offer you some champagne? I'm celebrating."
Bobby resisted the urge to stare at the man's hands and see if there was blood staining them. Reminding himself that he was there to rescue Dean and not set justice to the world, Bobby looked at the table instead. The bottle of cold, sweet wine was sweating in the sun, fat drops of water sliding down its long neck. Tempting as it was to refresh his parched throat, Bobby wasn't about to accept anything coming from that man's hands. He'd learned his lesson with the African dream root that had nearly killed him.
Closer to Marcus stood an open laptop, the screen turned away from Bobby. Beside the computer there was a black bowl surrounded by four, short, red candles.
The large bowl filled with aromatic herbs could be taken as nothing but decorative by most people looking at it. As a hunter, Bobby knew better.
He could see the rosemary, wormwood; smelled the hyssop somewhere in there too. Those were enough for Bobby to know that the mix was meant to be used in a summoning ritual. He could only assume that Marcus was going to use that to make himself an angel-phone call.
"It was faster than I'd thought," Bobby said as a way of greeting the other man, taking a sit in front of him. The chairs were made of metal, iron like the table, and the sun had managed to heat them enough to make Bobby shift uncomfortably as he sat.
Veering his attention from the scalding seat to the items displayed in front of him, Bobby almost chuckled as he saw the symbols drawn on the table, under the bowl.
Bobby would be extremely surprised if that set of symbols managed to call any sort of angel. Clearly, the hunters that Marcus had hired were a bunch of idiots.
The symbols were in ancient Hebrew.
It was obvious that, whoever the brilliant mind behind the writing had been, they'd just assumed that Earth geography and Bible history were of any actual consequence to real angels.
Granted, in the very first summoning ritual that Bobby had made that involved an angel, he had used Latin. But then again, at the time, he had no idea that the thing after Dean had been a winged being, so he'd just gone with the most broad spectrum summoning he could think of.
It was only later, and because Castiel had told them so, that Bobby had started using Enochian for everything angel-related.
There was no way for other hunters to know that, Bobby realized. And there was no way that summoning would get Marcus anything other than a nice smell.
"Can I see it?" Marcus asked, hand extended in Bobby's direction like an eager child asking for candy.
Bobby reached inside his jacket and pulled the linen cloth he had used to wrap the rusty nail, handing it over. He waited for any kind of physical reaction from the other man as he grabbed the nail with his bare hands.
However, like Sam, Marcus seemed impervious to the burning effects of the nail. Rather than piss him off, the surprising fact left Bobby wondering about what this man and Sam could have in common that he did not.
Marcus picked it up with a reverence that Bobby was sure to have little to none religious sentiment. No, there was something more dangerous glinting in Marcus' eyes as he held the ancient artifact and it had nothing whatsoever to do with any spiritual pursuit.
"You don't mind if I test it first, do you?" Marcus asked.
Bobby nodded, even though he was aware that his consent carried no real weight. He sat back, aiming to look relaxed and waited. He was sure that Marcus would pull up some elaborate machine to test how old that Nail was or call in some expert to look at it. Instead, the other man pulled out a small bottle of peroxide from his pocket.
It was rather anticlimactic.
"Peroxide?" Bobby found himself asking.
Marcus smirked. "The composition of iron in Israel, the ancient territory the Romans called Judea, was crap. Every piece of iron used by the occupying Romans was shipped from the north of Europe, from the mines in Germania mostly," he explained, pouring a few drops of the peroxide over the Nail. "German iron, because it had high concentrations of phosphorous in its composition, was a favorite of the Romans."
Bobby watched the Nail intently as Marcus picked it up and turned it in the sunlight. Small flecks of light glinted off, hidden beneath the rust. "The Greeks had a funny name for this mineral," Marcus went on, apparently satisfied with the metal's reaction. "They called it Lucifer...'The light bringer'. Ironic, isn't?"
Bobby stopped himself from making any sort of comment, silently thanking Balthazar for bringing them, at least, the right type of metal nail. "Our deal?" Bobby inquired, looking nervously around. It hadn't escaped his attention that two armed guards had replaced the butler.
The look that Marcus gave him made Bobby actually fear for his life. Demons and other monsters, the older hunter knew how to gauge their actions. It was a risky game but one that Bobby played without fear because the rules never changed and everyone played by them.
This guy... he wasn't exactly one of the things that Bobby was used to hunt, but there was no human connection behind those brown eyes either; no sympathy for a fellow human, no empathy for the living. In a way that frightened Bobby more than he would have cared to admit, Marcus reminded him of Sam, back when he was minus a soul.
"You seem very eager to be in the presence of a being that you claim to hate," Marcus said, drying the Nail carefully and putting it in his pocket.
Bobby raised an eyebrow. "I'm a curious man... and I have to say, I'm mighty curious to know what do you intend to do with that."
The other man smiled. "I guarantee you front row, Mr. Singer. Front row."
Bobby settled back on his chair. Inside, he wanted nothing more than to take this chance and get as far away from that psychopath as he could. However, Bobby's part in the plan involved him sticking around for a little bit longer. "Let's see them angels then," he said resolute.
Marcus worked like an amateur. He mixed the herbs using his hands, instead of swirling the bowl around and he lit the candles in the wrong order. Still, when he threw the lit matchstick in to the bowl and the herbs ignited in a powerful blue flame, Bobby held his breath. Angels would not answer that summoning, but lord knows what would. He hoped that Balthazar was somewhere close by where he could see them, or else the angel would never get his cue to come in.
Five minutes passed of Bobby waiting and Marcus looking bored. "Enough of this," he said, sounding like a petulant child. "It was worth a shot, though."
When he pressed a button on the opened laptop, Bobby frowned. Was he trying to call an angel... by e-mail?
"Quite a feat, isn't it?" Marcus said, turning the screen around so that Bobby could see.
Even looking at it, Bobby had no idea what he was seeing. It was nothing but a series of squiggly lines, oscillating in gentle waves up and down.
Bobby was about to give in to curiosity and just ask what the hell was that when the computer screen cracked. A powerful, shrilling sound followed.
Hastily covering his ears, Bobby was pleased to see the slight touch of fear in Marcus' eyes. It was good to know that there was something human underneath that.
"You called?" Balthazar's accented voice sounded. He looked around, as if he was expecting to find someone else. "You're not Dean."
Marcus blinked, apparently not quite believing that whatever it was he had used, had worked. "No, I'm not," he finally managed to say. "And you're not Castiel."
"Brilliant deduction," Balthazar said, managing to sound annoyed and nonchalant at the same time. "Now that we've establish who we're not, I think I have more important things to attend to. Like watching paint slowly dry."
"The call was for Castiel," Marcus went on, ignoring the dismissive tone of the angel. "Why hasn't he answered?"
"The 'call' was made by Dean Winchester," Balthazar replied, his whining tone mockingly similar to Marcus'. "Why isn't hehere? Castiel was busy; he sent me in his stead. Which, by the way, was a huge waste of my precious time," Balthazar said all in one go, getting ready to leave. "Not to mention the fact that you blared so loud that who knows who else might be coming to party, a good enough reason for me to not stick around," he added, with a pointed look at Bobby, enough for the older man to know that that last part was, at least, true.
Listening to them talk, it finally clicked in Bobby's head what those wavy lines on Marcus' computer had been.
Dean's brain waves.
The bastard had somehow conned Dean into calling Castiel, recorded it and actually managed to broadcast them at will. It was ingenious... in an unbelievably evil kind of way.
Marcus figured that the wrong angel was better than no angel at all. "Wait! I command you to stay," he said, voice uncertain, as if he wasn't all that sure that this would work.
The guards were there, Bobby realized, for the event the angel decided to turn on Marcus, not because of him. That rich idiot really thought that a bunch of armed gorillas would be able to do anything against an angel if he decided to get angry or the Holy Nail failed to work. Bobby could almost feel pity for the man.
The smears of red near each of the security men made Bobby rethink his judgment. Looking closer, Bobby was almost certain that those were angel banishing sigils, just waiting to be used.
Maybe not such a complete idiot after all.
Balthazar smirked for one second, before his whole expression fell as he closed his eyes and opened them, a breath later, to find himself still in the same place. "How the bloody hell are you doing that?" he asked, outrage.
Marcus smiled in triumph, pulling the rusty nail from his pocket, a magician reveling his trick.
Balthazar could've been an actor, so good he was at feigning his shocked surprise. "How did you get one of those? We... none should've remained on Earth."
"Well, I tip my hat to you," Bobby cut in, before Balthazar took his acting too far. "You've managed to flabbergast one of them into babbling."
"You can further impress," Marcus answered, eyeing Balthazar, "by killing him," he added with a nod towards Bobby.
"What?"
"What?"
Bobby and Balthazar shouted nearly in unison. Each looked more surprised than the other.
"Well, I do require proof that this angel is truly under my dominion," Marcus said. Anyone hearing him would say that his reasons were the most understandable in the whole wide world. "And my plans aren't really of the sharing type. All of my employees, except for a few selected security guards, have already been taken care of. Which leaves you, Mr. Singer... like any that has knowledge of what I'm doing here, I can't let you go."
"Why the hell not?" Bobby asked, trying to weigh his chances of out running the guards' bullets and an angel. What kind of person killed his whole staff to keep a secret?
Marcus gave him a look. "Do you really think I don't know the real reason why you are here, Mr. Singer? That I'm not aware that, somewhere in my property, Sam Winchester is trying to find his brother in this very moment?"
It wasn't all that hard for Bobby to pretend to be surprised this time around. He had hoped that the man wouldn't make the connection, but truly, that was just wishful thinking. If Marcus had collected from Dean's mind the knowledge that Bobby was Dean's friend and that Sam was alive, the fact that they would do anything for that boy was obvious.
Fortunately, Marcus seemed under the impression that they still had no clue where Dean was.
"Don't worry... my guards will find him soon, but you won't be around to see him die," Marcus said, managing to sound like he was doing a favor to Bobby.
"Let me get this straight," Balthazar interrupted. "You want me to kill the old man to prove that the nail truly works, correct?" At Marcus impatient nod, the angel went on. "What makes you think that I give a fuck about the old fart? Killing him proves absolutely nothing."
"The fact that you're stalling tells me that you do care," Marcus countered. "Now, kill him!"
"Very well," Balthazar simply said with a shrug. With a faint rustle of wings, he was standing right next to Bobby. He reached out a finger and touched the older man's chest, blinking him out of existence.
Castiel looked down on Dean with what could only be described as pity in his eyes. "You failed, Dean… in everything that you've set yourself to do. You failed at stopping Lucifer; you failed at saving Sam… you failed as a son, as a brother, as a husband and as a father."
Each word coming from Castiel's mouth felt like a slap in Dean's soul. It did not matter who said it; Dean knew he was right, he had known it for a very long time. Still on the floor, Dean curled in on himself, his side pressing against the unnaturally warm concrete. He wanted nothing more than to disappear from existence, to make himself small enough and blend with the rest of the debris scattered around him. Anything to make Castiel from voicing what Dean already knew.
"The only thing you are good at," Castiel went on, "is killing, Dean. Even the ones you love, they don't stand much of a chance of surviving. You do nothing but surround yourself with death."
Dean sobbed, grabbing his useless legs. "Shut up… please shut up…"
"Have you ever wondered, Dean, why Death seems so amused by your presence? Why such a powerful Horsemen would bother to give in to any of your requests?" Castiel asked, sounding entertained by the answer he was about to give. "He sees you as an apprentice, Dean… he sees you as Death."
"Please, just... go away," Dean mumbled, not wanting to face the angel's eyes. He knew he would only find contempt and disappointment in them.
"He's coming, Dean," Castiel whispered, his voice taking in a comforting tone. "It will be over soon. You will be free." And then he was gone in a mad whirl of feathers.
Dean looked up, startled. Who was coming? Death?
And then Dean remembered, all those times when he had felt like someone was watching him, chasing him. Someone who looked like Sam.
But those had been dreams, hallucinations, whatever weird fruit his mind had decided to haunt him with, Dean was sure of that.
Something moved at the edge of his vision and Dean twisted around. All around him, the darkness seemed to close in, growing and devouring the light. In only seconds, it became impossible to see more than two feet in any direction.
Fumbling with the lighter one more time, Dean aimed the flickering light to the far side of the room. The broken faces of smashed statues and the upturned metal skeletons of the broken shelves stared back at him, laden with momentous gravitas, like they too were waiting for something to happen.
A shadow raced through the ceiling, fast moving and too big for it to be a rat. Looking down, all Dean could see was debris.
Either the broken statues had moved, or Dean was imagining it.
How could he be sure of what was real and what was a dream? His life seemed to skip beats, like a scratched record and he had to wonder: where did reality reside? In the moments he remembered… or the skipped bits when the needle hit nothing but empty air in that scratched record?
Dean knew he remembered things that had never happened, in the same way he had forgotten others that he was sure he should remember.
Why couldn't he remember a single day after coming out of the hospital? Why did he feel Castiel was right, that he and Death were far too well acquainted, so much so that Dean felt like he had walked in Death's shoes at least once?
It made no sense.
And yet, there were things that left room for no confusion or doubt. Dean was alone and the impending feeling of doom refused to leave him.
He had lost everything, everyone he once loved. Dean knew that, in another life, whatever was coming for him wouldn't frighten him. In fact, he would welcome it.
But that wasn't the case. There was something that he was supposed to do, something too important to leave hanging. Something that Dean could not abandon.
The only thing that Dean did not know was whether that was something that he was supposed to do in this life or that other one that seemed to haunt his every breath, like a shadow that shifted in the light.
Dean figured that it wouldn't make much difference. He felt no pain, but he could see the pool of blood growing larger and larger underneath his broken leg. No one would arrive at the archives until morning and, by then, Dean was sure that he would be nothing more than another corpse to add to the mess that they would leave behind.
The faint growl of a car engine was the last thing that Dean thought he'd hear down there. Sweaty fingers flickered the lighter on, sliding off the ignition and producing nothing but white sparkles as it failed to ignite.
Dean cursed as he lost his grip on the lighter and heard it tumbling to the floor. In the darkness that followed, the squeaking noise of a car door opening and then being slummed shut preceded loud footsteps.
Unhurried. Certain of their direction, even in the most complete dark.
"Hi, Dean," a familiar voice whispered from the darkness. "No more running now. Now you finally die, brother."
Marcus could barely hide his exhilaration. Granted, the lean man with a British accent was hardly what he had envisioned an angel would look like, but the whole concept of using vessels meant that it would be hard for him to see an angel's true form. He wondered if the accent was due to the vessel or a preference of the angel himself.
Still, it was the first time that Marcus had ever been in the presence of such a powerful being, one that was at his command and the feeling was more intoxicating than he had anticipated.
The poisoned champagne he'd used to kill the scientists and house staff would've been too easy, but Singer had not touched it. Rather than just order one of his guards to shoot the man and, once he was found, Sam as well, Marcus realized that with such an unstoppable power at his reach, he couldn't stop himself. He wanted to see an angel smite someone.
Bobby was just handy.
To be honest, Marcus had imagined something a little more spectacular than just a disappearing body, but the persuasiveness of the action spoke for itself. One second the man was there, the next he was gone. Forever. Atoms scattered through the Universe.
It was time to move on to final step of his plan, the one that Marcus had worked so hard to achieve. "Very good," he said, looking the strange looking angel in the eyes. "Now, I want you to abandon your current vessel and use me instead. Given time, we might even learn to work as a team, but for now, I have no choice but to take over a—"
"Wha-? Stop talking, little man!" Balthazar said, one hand raised and his eyebrows trying to escape into his hairline. "Have you lost what little mind you have left?"
Marcus fascination for angels was quickly disappearing every time this one talked. Maybe Dean had figured them right, maybe all of them were dicks. He exchanged a quick look with his head of security, content to see that the man's hand was already poised and ready, hovering above the nearest banishing sigil. Just in case...
"Not every one of you dancing monkeys can be a vessel, you dimwit," Balthazar went on. "You need to be of certain—"
"Bloodlines, yes, I'm aware of all that," Marcus said, talking over the angel. "I wasn't asking for your opinion, I was commanding you to do it," he said dryly.
Balthazar gave him a long look, long enough that Marcus found himself grasping the Holy Nail tighter. What if it had all been an act? What if he had been wrong about the strength of the relic? What if—
"You're altered yourself," Balthazar said after a while, his scrutiny apparently having revealed more than Marcus was willing to share. "You sneaky bastard!" the angel said with an amused smile. "You actually mixed yourself with Dean Winchester's essence to become a vessel... kinky!"
Reading the impatient look that Marcus was sure to be all over his face, the angel dropped the humor and turned serious for a moment. "I can't really say no to you," he started, stating the obvious. "But you should be aware that whatever concoction you invented to make yourself suitable for being an angel vessel... it won't work. It works for small things, like grabbing that Holy Nail without burning your fingers off, but on something like me? Not so much."
"And I'm supposed to believe your word on it," Marcus said in return. "Against the opinion of some of the best geneticist of this country?"
"Genetic therapy?" Balthazar said with an impressed whistle. "Good start... but it takes a wee bit more than a few physical bits and bobs. It's a complicated union that requires something more spiritual than what you can find inside any test tu—"
"Enough of this nonsense!" Marcus let out like a petulant child that had waited too long for a piece of candy. "I knew you would try some sort of trick to weasel your way out of this union, so you might as well give up now, because I won't believe a word from your mouth. Obey me!"
Balthazar shrugged, like it really was no skin off his nose. "FYI, you better do something about those angelic protection sigils your house is covered in, at least until we move this party inside," the angel added with a disgusted look on his face. "I really don't think you want to be standing out here like a dick when the others arrive."
"Others?"
The eye-roll was not very angelic but it conveyed Balthazar's feelings quite effectively. "That 'call' you made... it came across so loudly in the angelic wave-lengths that I'm sure every angel in creation heard it... and that includes a couple ones who aren't in the Dean Winchester fan club," the angel went on, wording his explanation as if he was talking to particularly thick person. "As in, they want him dead... and if Raphael shows up, he won't stop long enough to check if you're him or not."
That Marcus actually paid attention to. He hadn't thought that far ahead, but it made sense that once he became an angel, he would be affected by the same spells and protections that he had used to keep Dean hidden and untouchable. Also, from what he had gathered from Dean's memories, Raphael was not a force that he would want to reckon with.
"Alex," Marcus called out to one of the security men guarding the yard. "Take Fred and the others and take care of it. After we go inside, I want to do redo them, are we clear?"
With his back turned, Marcus and his men missed the brief smile that spread across Balthazar's lips.
"So, we're doing this or what?" Marcus asked, turning his attention back to the angel.
Balthazar nodded, taking a seat by the table. "You might want to close your eyes for this part," the angel warned.
After that, Marcus was lost in a pool of whiteness.