Deal with the devil

The next day the Winchesters and Aliza discussed the case they were on over breakfast. Dean had ordered a plate full of all kinds of meat, while Sam had some toast. Aliza had some eggs and bacon, but so far she had left it untouched. Her stomach was too much in a knot to eat.

'So we might want to check out that place. Do you agree?' Sam asked Aliza.

She was mindlessly staring at a point in the distance. Sam waved his hand through her line of sight.

'Aliza?'

She shook her head awake. 'Sorry what?'

'What got your head in the clouds?' Dean asked with a mouthful.

Aliza blushed a little. 'Things.'

'Things?' Dean asked.

'Yeah…,' she responded, her mind wandering again.

Sam gave a deep sigh. 'Sorry to say so, but you might want your head in this case before you walk in a supernatural fight. If you don't feel like it you can also…,'

She straightened her back. 'No, no I'm in. I want to find this son of a bitch. I can push this aside for the time being. Just tell me what you were asking me a moment ago.'

Sam gave her a long thoughtful look before answering:

'Yesterday someone else was seen wandering into the woods. I thought we could check out that area.'

Aliza nodded. 'Good. Let's gear up and go. We scout the area at daylight. At night there might be another victim, so we should stay and wait it out.'

Sam nodded. 'Seems like a plan.'

Dressed in hiker clothing, with medium backpacks strapped to their backs, the three hunters walked through the forest. This town was surrounded by big woods. There was a lot of ground to cover. Plus, they didn't really know what they were looking for. Aliza kind of hoped they would find an old farm or country house.

Dean seemed to be quickening the pace, as Sam fell behind next to her.

'I meant to give you my excuses,' he started.

Aliza looked up at the way taller guy. She never saw herself as too short, but walking next to Sam gave her some other ideas.

'What for?'

He gave a little smile. 'My reaction yesterday. I've been thinking about it, and my reaction was irrational. You're a hunter, not a little defenseless girl.'

Aliza smiled back. 'There isn't really a going back after being chased by a vampire when you're ten years old.'

Sam directly looked at her. 'I'm sorry, but I can't remember a lot of our time back then. What happened?'

'Even if you did remember, you wouldn't know this story. You were too young to know about monsters.'

'You were only one or two years older,' Sam joked back.

'I know. I was too young. Dean pitied me. Anyway, the story ain't pretty. Like…my entire life since that moment. My mother was possessed by a demon and she killed my father. She tried to kill me too, by sending a vampire after me. I ran into Bobby's car yard where he killed the vampire. He went back to my mother, and figured out what she was. Then he took me in. A couple of days later you two showed up in the middle of the night. Dean thought I was an intruder, and I saw him as one. We fought until Bobby put us apart,' she smiled at the memory.

'I do hazily remember that,' Sam said. 'Sounds like a lot of crap you had to get through.'

'Don't I know it,' she said softly.

They were quiet for a while. The only sounds around them where the dead leaves on the ground they walked through and some birds in the distance. The air was quite chilly, but nothing they didn't prepare for.

'Sam?' Aliza managed to squeeze out. She tried to keep her eyes focused on the forest ground.

'Yes?' he answered.

She started two times without making a sound. She took a deep breath before finally asking:

'Is Bobby dead?'

Not just Sam, but also Dean stopped in his tracks. They turned to face her. Hurt was readable on their faces.

'How did you know?' Dean asked.

Aliza looked away, suppressing the tears. 'I took some habits over from him, and I noticed you flinch or look really hurt whenever I do that. Plus, the guy was a hunter.'

She took a moment before continuing. 'How did he die?'

Sam took a deep shuddering breath. 'He was shot by Dick Roman, leader of the Leviathans.'

Aliza nodded, her eyes on the ground. 'Thank you for telling me.'

They continued their hike in silence.

The sun had set, and they had yet not found anything. The forest seemed quiet, like nothing happened or would happen. They started to lose hope, at the moment Aliza spotted movement.

'There,' she pointed excitedly.

'What?' Dean asked, scanning the dark surroundings.

'I saw someone. Come on.'

They moved quietly through the trees. When they came closer they saw it more clearly: a man was walking through the forest. He seemed determined on his destiny. Sam stepped on a branch that snapped. The head of the man snapped up in their direction. All three froze in their place. It was hard to see his face in the darkness, but Aliza was a hundred percent sure she saw his eyes turn black. Then he walked on.

'Demon,' Aliza whispered.

'Seems like you were right,' Dean told Sam.

'That doesn't make me feel better,' Sam whispered back.

It didn't make Aliza feel any better either. Demons couldn't hurt her, what was a good thing. But Dean and Sam would find out about her deal with Crowley. However, there was no going back now.

They continued to follow the man, until he came into a clearing. There were more people there. They were illuminated by some torches that stood around the clearing. There were three men standing there, all in black suits. Their eyes matched their clothing.

'All demons,' Dean whispered. They all settled behind individual trees at the edge of the clearing.

The man walked up to a chair. He sat down, and the other demons strapped his hands and feet down. Once he was secured, the man opened his mouth and dark demon smoke erupted from him. It circled into the sky and flew away. Then the real man woke up. He shrieked when he noticed his surroundings.

'Welcome Peter,' one of the demons said with an evil smirk. 'We're going to have a nice chat.'

Peter struggled, trying to break free. 'Help me!' he screamed.

The demon punched him hard across the face. 'No need for that. There is no one that can hear you. Now, we can do this the easy way,' the demon took a knife from his pocket, 'or the hard way. I look forward to the hard way, to be honest.'

'I'm not telling you anything, devil!' Peter said heroically. It was however the stupidest thing he could do.

'You don't have to tell me anything. But you will tell my boss,' the demon told him. The evil smirk never left his face, but it grew bigger now.

'We need to engage,' Aliza whispered.

The boys seemed to agree. At the same moment two things happened. The three hunters shot out from their hiding place, leaving the backpacks behind, but all three armed. Then a new person appeared in front of Peter.

The hunters didn't notice the new arrival for a moment. Dean shot the Cult into one of the demons. He glowed up and plummeted down to the earth. Aliza and Sam rushed forward. But then they noticed the new arrival, and both stopped.

'Well, well. This is interesting.'

Sam grit his teeth. 'Crowley.'

Dean caught up on them, flanking Sam. 'What are you doing here, you son of a bitch?' Dean shouted at Crowley.

Crowley gave a little smile. 'Could ask you the same thing, squirrel.' Then he turned his attention to Aliza.

'And what a pleasure it is to see you again. Honestly, I thought you were long gone. Killed yourself or let someone else do it.'

Both brothers turned their faces to Aliza.

'You know him?' they both asked.

Aliza didn't take her aim away from Crowley. 'We met once.'

The other two demons started to engage the intruders. Crowley held up his hand and they stopped.

'Sorry boys, can't let you do that.'

'Since when does the king of the crossroads have so much influence?' she tried to divert the attention.

Crowley faked a hurt look. 'I'm king of Hell now, sweetheart.'

Aliza swallowed. 'Oh.'

'Why don't you attack us?' Sam demanded.

Crowley looked from Sam to Aliza. 'Oh, I bet this little sweetheart didn't mention our earlier encounter. You see, we made a deal.'

Dean looked up in surprise. 'You sold your soul?'

Aliza sighed and lowered her aim at Crowley. Something told her the rock salt wasn't going to work anyway.

'No, I didn't. I made one of the best deals ever. I tricked this guy,' she said while pointing at Crowley. 'And that's why they do not attack. My end of the deal was, that no demon can hurt me. Not even the king here.'

They both looked at her with a look of surprise and horror.

'And what did he want?' Sam asked.

Aliza walked to stand in front of the Winchesters. She stroked her hand past Dean's.

'None of that is relevant now. Deal or not, this guy deserves to die.'

She maneuvered the Cult from Dean's hand and shot Crowley in the heart. Or the place there would be a heart, if he had one. Crowley fell back. He was still for a moment. Then he grunted in pain as he pulled the bullet from his flesh.

'Auch!' He announced, like she had hit him with a frying pan.

Aliza stared in horror at Crowley, who came back to his feet. He dusted his suit and looked flushed with anger.

'You have any idea how much this suit costs?!' he yelled.

Aliza couldn't imagine him honestly paying for anything.

Crowley twisted his hand in a quick move. Aliza suddenly felt all the air leave her lungs. She grabbed for her neck as she fell to her knees.

'You can't hurt me…Crowley!' she squeaked.

'You didn't read the contract, sweetie,' he said, back in his calm aura.

Aliza raised an eyebrow. 'There was no contract!'

'There is always a contract,' Crowley said as there appeared a long list in his hand. It rolled all the way up to her over the ground.

'And it clearly states here, that in the case you try to kill me, the deal is off. No more protecting you, lassie. And I am really glad. Now I can finally do what you should have years ago!'

Aliza prepared for the end. With a flick of his hand he could snap her neck. She was sure she saw Crowley move, when she vaguely heard a sound and looked up at someone's legs. In one moment she saw Crowley move and then he was gone. She wasn't in the forest anymore. The grip on her neck had disappeared and she toppled over to the ground. She landed on a soft carpet.

'Aliza!' she heard Sam yell.

Then she coughed to regain her breath. She squeaked but managed to regain her breath. Someone pulled her back on her knees. She focused her eyes and saw Castiel crouching in front of her. Once again, he placed his fingers on her temple to heal her.

'Are you okay?' he asked concerned.

Aliza nodded. 'I'm fine. Thanks.'

Held tight by her arms, Castiel lifted her back to her feet. She wasn't even completely standing before Dean started yelling at her.

'You made a deal with Crowley? And you never mentioned it?! Is that your big secret?' Dean yelled, his face burning red.

Aliza stumbled a little, but Castiel caught her. She leaned against his chest and stared up at the angel. It was hard to concentrate, but she did manage to answer.

'Back then he was a simple crossroad demon, not the king of Hell. And like I said: I had the best deal ever. I had to convince him to go along with it.'

Sam stepped up next to his brother. 'Then what was his end of the deal, if not your soul?'

Aliza pushed Castiel lightly away, indicating she could stand on her own. Only now she noticed they were back in the motel. She closed her eyes, but knew she needed to answer.

'Crowley wanted to see my soul.'

All three looked confused. 'Why would he want to see it?' Sam asked.

Aliza balled her fists. She started to get angry. Why did she have to tell anything, while the Winchesters had a million secrets she didn't know of?

'You should know Dean,' Aliza started. She gestured wildly with her arms. 'Your dad said it. Back then he knew. Bobby knew. I knew! But I didn't want to believe it. I didn't want to be that.'

Dean looked down, searching his memories. Then he seemed to remember. He looked back up at her with concern.

'You're not human,' he stated.

Sam and Castiel looked at him. 'What? That can't be,' Sam exclaimed. Then they looked back at Aliza, who had tears of anger and hurt in her eyes.

'I'm not human. Crowley knew it, and he wanted to know what I was. Since that day, I lived with a knowledge I never wanted.'

She took slow, threatening steps closer to Dean. She stopped in front of him, her eyes fixed on his.

'I'm a monster,' she said through gritted teeth.

No one seemed to have a reaction to that. For a long moment all was quiet. Aliza and Dean kept staring at each other.

'Did you ever kill anybody?' Sam asked with a little voice, clearly afraid of the answer.

Aliza finally looked away from the elder brother.

'No. No human, just monsters.'

'Than it's not that bad, right?' Sam tried.

Aliza looked at him in disbelief. 'I'm telling you I'm the thing you hunt, and you think it's 'not that bad'?'

He shrugged. 'Maybe we can help you.'

At that, Aliza smiled. It was a wicked smile of a woman who lost hope. 'You can't. I am what I am. Can't change it.'

'But you can fight it,' Sam went on.

Aliza turned her face partly, so she could see him in the corner of her eye. She nodded.

'Then there is hope.'

Another long silence hit them. Aliza had her back turned on the others. She didn't allow herself to cry anymore, so she just stared at the wall.

'We can fix this,' Dean suddenly said. Aliza turned around.

'We fixed so much that can't be fixed. We both died, multiple times, and here we are. We fixed the apocalypse, an invasion of Leviathans…damn us if we can't fix you.'

She looked away. 'Did you cure a vampire? Did you make a demon human again?' she tried.

Dean gave a weird sort of laugh. 'As a matter of fact…'

'Dean! I was born this way! There is no fixing that!' Aliza shouted angrily.

'Well, then we can live with it, the way you live with it,' he told her.

She didn't make any move, but Dean could see she started to take his words to her heart. He walked over to her and pulled her in a hug. He stroked his hand over her hair.

'You're with us now. Maybe it was a stupid choice, since we seem to attract world's biggest problems. But we are also very good at caring. Taking care of those around us. And sometimes we fail…' he wandered off, probably thinking about all he had lost, 'but sometimes we succeed too. And for one, I'm not giving up on you.'

If Aliza was a more emotional person, she might have cried. Even when she didn't, his words meant a lot to her. Then she felt a strong hand on her shoulder. Sam appeared next to them.

'Me neither.'

She smiled at him from Dean's embrace. Then they let go.

'Me neither,' Castiel said, who hadn't moved from his spot. However, he gave her a warm smile.

Aliza started to feel awkward under all the attention.

'Alright, enough of the chick-flick moments for one day,' she told them jokingly.

'I agree. Don't know about you guys, but I'm starving! How about we order some pizza and watch some movies?' Dean proposed.

They all agreed.

The evening turned out lovely. They all sat on the two beds in Dean's and Sam's room. The brothers occupied the one bed, Castiel and Aliza the other. All three (Castiel didn't need food) had a pizza box in front of them. They watched the Terminator on the little motel television. Castiel made some comments on the movie, who turned out to be hilarious. They all had a good laugh. Aliza couldn't remember when exactly she fell asleep, but she did remember it was on Castiel's lap.

Hey guys!...or I could say girls, because, honestly...most of you are girls. Heads up if you are a guy!

I noticed a lot of new story follow/favs and some reviews and I am really happy with those!

I finally figured out how I want to end this story. It's all there...I just need to write it down. It might take some time, but I WILL FINISH THIS STORY!

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