Alyssa sat on the hood of her car, watching the sun as it set across the ocean. She glanced back at the bouquet beside her, guilt eating at her. She picked the bouquet up, hugging it close for a moment as tears slipped from her eyes, unbidden. She stood up, hands shaking, and threw the bouquet across the railing and into the ocean. If there was a grave site she could have gone to, she would have been there by now. She would have been bawling her eyes out with guilt and sorrow and rage. But she didn't have that option.

She smiled weakly at herself. If Dean knew she was doing this… Well, she wasn't sure whether he would be angry or exasperated. But there was one thing she was sure of. Dean would at least, hopefully, be grateful that she wasn't giving up. She wasn't going to be like Sam. She had fed Kat and Dean to the wolves and they had been swallowed whole. Alyssa would be damned if she left them to that fate -whatever that fate was, exactly. They were her friends -no, no. They were her family. Whatever Sam said. It didn't matter. She wasn't going to let them rot in whatever Hell they'd found themselves in.

Sometimes, she couldn't remember who she was crying for. But she liked to think that it wasn't for herself, because she didn't deserve it. She was alive. She had survived Crowley's manipulations of her and he hadn't come calling for her aid since. And if he ever showed up again, she had a few tricks up her sleeve for that bastard. She liked to think that she was crying for the friends she had lost and the ones that she wasn't sure she could save. She didn't know the first thing about what had happened to them. Her attempts at contacting Castiel or any other angel had been ignored. She wasn't desperate enough to try her luck with a demon yet, but it was getting close. She had attempted to call Bobby but the number was disconnected and his place abandoned. She didn't have the time to try and track him down; she was sure he was fine on his own, that he could manage. She wasn't so sure about Dean and Kat.

And Sam. Sam she knew he was okay. He was living in Arizona or wherever with that woman. And their dog. She grimaced. Well. There was no use in expecting him to do anything. She was already looking to find Sora, to track down the only other person who was present at the time of the release.

Chapter Thirty, Hey Brother

They got separated. Kat wasn't even sure of how -or when, exactly, but here she was. In the middle of freaking Purgatory. Surrounded by a bunch of snarling vampires, ready to tear into her. Human blood was a real nice treat to these not-so-undead-dead bastards. And this is what she got. Not for being a hunter, no, because she hadn't killed a vampire in her line of work. She'd killed a lot of other things, predominantly ghosts who were either in heaven or hell -or who knows, there could be a Limbo somewhere out there, waiting to take her soul next. Probably was. There was Heaven and Hell. And even Purgatory. Nice resting place for monsters. Not so great for a human, any human, who was stuck with a pack of vampires. Were they a pack or a flock? Bats lived in colonies; was colony more accurate? Didn't really matter.

The one in the lead hissed, baring his double set of fangs. No doubt frightening under normal situations. But this, this was a long way away from normal. Even Winchester levels of normal. Then again, she was here with a Winchester. This might just be the next level in Winchester insanity. But she hadn't seen Dean since they got here.

Kat had been appeared here, in the middle of a forest with Dean. They were completely alone. They had been ambushed by a group of vampires, got separated, and now Kat wasn't really sure where Dean was. Or how she was going to get back to him. Considering that she was stuck as a hostage to the vampires surrounding her. But she watched and she waited. The vampires weren't safe from the bigger, badder monsters waiting in Purgatory. No. And carrying a live human with them? Wasn't exactly their best plan, no matter how many of the suckers there were.

The werewolves and the shifters got together, ambushed them as a whole. Kat ran while she still could, took off into the distance, weaponless and alone. There were a few tracks she could follow, if she wanted to. But tracks meant predators in this alien land. So she ran until there weren't any tracks. And then she ran until she couldn't move a muscle. Kat laid on the ground, the deadened forest around her eerily silent except for her heavy breathing.

No sign of Dean.

As time passed, innumerable days and nights, Kat began to realize that this was her reality. This dead place, with its set lack of weather, with ravenous monsters hunting for the wayward Winchester. Kat was a pawn to them. If they had Kat, they could get to Dean. But not every monster cared about him. Many of them just wanted a last human meal.

Perhaps, for the first time in over twenty years, Kat was grateful to her mother. She knew how to survive, how to keep on going. But there was no way she could last forever, could survive this hell. Every time she shut her eyes, the howls and screams woke her up. She took to the habit of catnapping and when she could, scaled a tree and tried to sleep. It was terrifying and eating away her nerves until there was nothing left.

The worst were the harpies. In Purgatory, their true forms were revealed. Naked women with eagle wings, fully capable of flight and who were jealous of anyone they thought prettier than themselves. Kat lost track of time, lost the count of day and night, and screamed herself hoarse. Harpies liked to play with their food. And these seven women had a bone to pick with hunters. They caught Kat when she was foraging; swooped down, slamming their talons into the back of her shoulders and carried her ten feet into the air before tossing her amongst themselves like a silly doll. They carried her like that, ignoring her screams of terror as they flew back to their nest.

"Our babies will feed tonight!" cried the oldest of the harpies, her long silvery hair billowing behind her.

"They will taste human flesh!" crowed the other, yellowed teeth gleaming. "They will know our satisfaction!"

"Hunters," growled the third, swooping under Kat's trapped body. "Stupid hunters, she'll taste all the sweeter sisters!" And with an inhuman sound, the third of the harpies flew off.

Kat couldn't move. She could feel the blood pouring down her back. Fighting would make the wound worse and a fall from this height would kill her. She didn't know if it would be a quick death, or what would exactly happen to her if she died down here. Would she get to heaven or hell? Or would she be stuck here as some kind of twisted shade? She really didn't want to find out. She grunted in pain, feeling the harpy currently carrying her swing her body up higher as she released the hunter.

Kat screamed, unable to help herself, no longer sure if it was in pain or terror alone as she was passed to another harpy. For a sickening moment, she flew through the air but nothing grabbed her, no claws trapped her. She plunged down through the air, eyes wide as she let out a bloodcurdling scream as her body plummeted through the air. And then she heard the laughter. Lazily, the harpy with yellow teeth flew along down with her. Just before she landed, the harpy buried her talons into her leg and hauled her upwards.

Kat was still screaming, this time in pain. Her leg was broken or dislocated or something. She couldn't think past the pain. When they tossed her onwards again, to another harpy, darkness wrapped around her in a blazing embrace of pain. And, for the first time since she had reached Purgatory, Kat felt peace and relief wrap around her.

XxXx

"Shit, Kat." It sounded like Dean. But it couldn't be him. He was dead. She was dead. They were all dead. "Oh god."

"She ain't gonna make it," came an unfamiliar voice.

"Shut up," Dean's sound a-like growled.

Kat was vaguely aware of hands fluttering over her body, as though he was hesitating to touch her. But why? She tried to open her eyes, to look at him, her lover, but her eyes wouldn't obey her. Nor would her hands or any part of her body.

"Put her out of her misery, brother. Please. She is no shape."

"Benny!" Dean snarled, his voice cutting through the quiet like a razor. "She. She means a lot to me. I'm not leaving her behind."

"You can't take her home with you," came the Southern accented voice. "She won't live long enough."

Then came the sound of a blade being unsheathed, a metallic sound that would echo in her mind forever. Dean was going to silence the voice; he would help Kat come back to herself. She was fuzzy, on everything. Couldn't get her eyes to open. She felt… tired, though. And then, it was as though time froze. For one moment, she could open her eyes. She was aware of the agony radiating from her body, pulsating from every broken bone and oozing wound. She would be dead of blood loss, her consciousness mostly elusive due to the overwhelming agony. But she saw. She watched as Dean lifted his blade, mouth set in a grimace, and he stabbed it through her heart.

It was as though she had never opened her eyes, hadn't seen him do it. She couldn't feel the blade as it cleaved through flesh and muscle. She was dead. But Kat felt very far from dead, indeed. And instead, she spent the next six hours, gruelingly aware of Dean as he dug her grave and placed her body in the earthen grave with a hoarse apology. Fire would attract other monsters. Kat didn't know how to be grateful for that, because it was agony to feel each shovel of soil that buried her deeper and deeper. She couldn't breathe. The fire would have been worse.

But… nothing made sense.

Kat didn't know how to measure the time, when there was only the voice in her head and an unresponsive body. She could hear. Dean had killed her. But she was… she was alive. Too many hours later, past the time in which Kat was dying to sleep, her body heaved in a breath of air and she found herself fighting soft soil to get free to breathe in fresh air. She clawed her way out of the shallow grave, to the abandoned gravesite.

And she knew then, that something was very wrong. Before she had time to ponder it, a brilliant white light opened from the forest canopy to surround her.

XxXx

Dean stared into the distance, unable to get the memory of Kat's mangled body from his head. It was like she had been pecked to pieces before she was dropped from twenty feet high. How she was still breathing, he didn't know. He tightened his grip on the blade. Goddamn Alyssa. When he got out, he was going to make sure she didn't get away with this.

Kat was dead.

And Alyssa was going to pay. Crowley too.

Sorry for whatever awkward transitions there are -and I know there are some. But hey, I got a chapter out and I still know where I want this fic to go. I haven't abandoned it.

And hey, I've got a lot of awesome ideas on what to do with where the Supernatural finale left us in connection to this fic of mine.