Demon Seals

Chapter Two: When the Dust Settled

So, do you remember my OFC who died at the end of "Demon Game", the empath Danielle Palmer? Well, she's not out of the picture, not by a long shot. Don't remember who she is? Then you've got some reading to do to catch up, starting with "Demon Virus".

This story will be told from three points of view: Dean, Sam, and Castiel. We've already seen where Dean's story picks up at almost a year after the events of "Demon's Year". Sam's story starts right where "Demon's Year" left off. As for Castiel, we're going back in time to right after the end of "Demon Game". Feel free to reread that story if needed to give you an idea of what's going on there.

I have never been so ambitious in my storytelling before. These three POV's will eventually meet and then continue from the same point in time, but I don't know how long it will take to get there. We've got a lot of ground to cover, and it's gonna be one helluva ride. I hope you enjoy this next chapter!

It was a nightmare come true. Long after his tears had dried, Sam sat on the floor of the house, staring at his brother's bloody, torn-up corpse. Ruby's empty host lay nearby, blue eyes as vacant as Dean's, but Sam ignored that body. It had been an empty shell that the demon had occupied for too long. Ruby was gone. Dean was gone.

Dean was dead.

Dean was in Hell.

Dean.

Sam heard approaching footsteps, but he had zero motivation to check and see who or what was approaching. A demon could walk in with every intention of killing him, and he knew he would put up no fight whatsoever.

"Sam?" It was Bobby. Sam heard him take in a sharp breath and knew he was seeing his brother's body. There were more footsteps, and Sam assumed that it was Ellen and Jo. The dismayed sobs and gasps he heard a moment later confirmed it. Everyone could see that — that —

— that Sam had failed his brother.

"Ruby?" Jo asked hesitantly.

"Gone," Sam rasped.

"And Lilith?"

"Left," Sam muttered. "She couldn't kill me, so she left."

"Couldn't kill you?" Bobby said. "I don't understand."

Sam shrugged. "She tried, she got scared, she left. That's it."

No one said anything for a minute or so.

"We need to get out of here," Ellen finally spoke up.

Sam didn't want to move, but he knew she was right. "Can I help you carry Dean's body?" Bobby asked.

Sam nodded woodenly and rose. He spotted the bloodied demon-killing knife a few feet away and picked it up with his injured hand, tucking it into his jacket pocket before turning to his brother's body. Jo and Ellen laid out some blankets in the backseat of the Impala, and the men carefully placed the body on top.

"We need to leave the city," Bobby said, "find someplace safe to burn Dean's body."

"No," Sam said at once.

"Sam —"

"I'm not doing it," Sam snapped, meeting the older man's eyes for the first time. "I'm going to find a way to bring him back. I won't burn his body. He's —" He took a steadying breath. "He's gonna need his body intact."

"Are you sure?" Ellen asked after a few seconds.

Sam nodded silently and headed for the driver's seat."Can I bandage your hand?" Bobby asked quietly.

Sam would rather let it be, but nodded after a moment and allowed the other Hunter to care for the cut he'd sustained when picking up the knife in the bedroom of that little girl.

Bobby said he knew a place in Illinois where they could get a simple wooden casket for Dean. "It's about 4 hours away in Pontiac," he explained. Sam agreed to make the drive, and the somber group headed out in the darkness, Sam doing his best to ignore the dead and unconscious bodies in the cul-de-sac of humans who had been abandoned by their demon hosts.

Dean was dead. That was all that mattered.

Bobby drove the Impala while Ellen and Jo followed behind in the truck. There was no music playing on the radio. No words spoken by the living men in the car.

Dean's dead. I failed.

When they reached Pontiac, Bobby sent the women to get the casket while he and Sam went in search of a place to clean up Dean's body for burial. They settled on a motel on the outskirts of the town that was mostly vacant. Bobby made the reservation while Sam parked out back.

Dean is dead.

Sam had never seen Bobby act with such tenderness as he did in helping Sam prepare his brother for burial. Sam took a few minutes to look for a place to bury his brother and identified a field in the midst of a small forest a few miles outside of Pontiac. Bobby called his wife and gave them coordinates to meet at.

The sun was just peeking above the horizon when they reached their destination. Jo, Ellen, and Bobby all pitched in to dig Dean's grave while Sam fashioned a simple wooden cross to use as the grave marker. They positioned the casket before moving Dean's body one again. Sam left a zippo in Dean's right hand, but claimed his necklace. He needed to keep something of his brother's near his person, so he carefully placed the cord over his head and situated the bronze amulet against his chest.

At last, it was time to lower the casket. Sam took a deep breath, raised his hand, and slowly raised the simple coffin just enough to move it over the grave. Then he carefully lowered it with care and precision he had never shown before. He grabbed a handful of dirt, and stood over the grave.

"I'm sorry," he choked out. "I thought I could keep you from…" A sob forced its way up his throat. "I'm gonna find a way to get you back," he promised. "I don't care what it takes." He dropped the handful of dirt and turned to grab a shovel.

After the grave had been filled back in, the four stood around the grave in the face of the rising sun.

"What do we do now?" Jo finally asked.

Sam had been thinking long and hard. Our family is cursed, he thought bitterly. I can't keep risking the lives of anyone else over our troubles. He swallowed hard, resolved himself in his choice, and then spoke, his words hard, pure, and powerful.

"Jo, Bobby, Ellen," he began, "the three of you are going to leave this place, go back home, and leave me as well as Dean's grave alone. You will not go looking for me. You will not call me. Any hints about my whereabouts will be ignored."

There was no way for the three to resist the mind control. They gave Sam heartbroken looks, but did as instructed. Soon, Sam was left alone to gaze at his brother's final (it's not final you're not gone forever) resting place in the light of the rising sun.

"I'm going to bring you back," he whispered. "I swear it."

The first time Castiel saw the soul his superiors would eventually label as "troublesome" was the day it arrived in Heaven.

Castiel hadn't seen souls at this point in their existence in several millenia. As a member of the holy garrison, Castiel's job was to guard and defend, not to sort and organize. There was a division of angels whose job was to oversee the passage of the souls into Heaven and place them in their appropriate spot in within the limitless boundaries of paradise. Castiel was usually busy attending to his duties; he had only been down to the soul's entryway a handful of times as a young cherub in the early days of Heaven after Lucifer's fall, but not since then.

"I have a new assignment for you," Sariah had told him earlier. "There is a soul in the entryway that did the work of Heaven at great personal cost. My superiors have requested that one of my garrison retrieve this soul and deliver it to a shared Heaven with its chosen life partner. I would ask that you be the one to carry out this task."

"Of course, Sariah," Castiel had answered at once. "I live to serve Heaven and our Father."

"Then go," Sariah had commanded. "The soul is currently in the care of Matholomew."

And so Castiel had taken flight, soaring to the entryway to the angel in question. "Hello, Matholomew," he greeted upon his arrival.

"Hello, Castiel," Matholomew returned with good cheer. "It is good to see you, brother."

"And you," Castiel said, tilting his head to try and see his new charge. "Is this the soul that I am to carry to its new home?"

"Indeed," Matholomew said, stepping aside to give Castiel his first true glimpse. "I would advice handling it with caution," he told the other angel. "It is behaving in a rather… curious manner."

"How so?" Castiel questioned, gazing at the small ball of light. It seemed to shake ever so slightly.

"Souls are in a state of… stasis, I suppose you could say, when they first arrive here," Matholomew explained. "They are unaware of their surroundings until they have been placed in their new home within paradise. But this soul…" He gestured to it. "It trembles at my touch," he finally said. "It is as though it is aware of where it is and what is happening to it, but this should not be possible."

"That is very odd, indeed," Castiel said. "I shall endeavor to handle it with care, then. I thank you for this knowledge, Matholomew."

"You are most welcome, brother," the other angel replied. Castiel reached forward carefully and moved the soul into the palm of his hand. He felt it quiver, felt it try to move itself, and he moved his hand closer to his torso so as to keep it more secure before he took flight again.

The paradise of his charge's life partner was currently rolling hills within a valley surrounded by mountains, filled with endless terrain to use with a strange contraption Castiel believed was called a for-wheel-or. He landed on a relatively flat part of the landscape and gently deposited his charge into the lush grass of that particular spot. It shined brightly, and then it broadened, twisted, formed itself into the physical representation of the person it had been before its death.

The soul was female with long, dark hair and pale skin. Her eyes were already open, revealing a mixture of sky, storm, and earth. She stared blankly at her surroundings for several seconds before she gasped and sat up.

"Who's there?" she called out loudly, looking around. "I know you're here, I can feel your presence."

This was a rather strange thing to say, since the female had a life partner nearby.

Stranger still, the female claimed to feel a presence.

She rose, eyes narrowed and lips pressed together firmly. Then she gasped, eyes widening and mouth falling open. "Oh my God," she said in a light voice, "I'm dead?" Castiel watched as she pushed her hands against her abdomen, pulled up her shirt, felt the bare skin of her torso. "I must be dead," she said. "So then this is Heaven?" She looked around. "But… who's presence did I feel?"

She frowned, looking around, and then she stopped moving very abruptly. "Another angel?" she said softly, looking around, looking up, looking right where Castiel was observing. How was this possible?

"Haven't I already done enough?" the female spoke in a very loud voice this time. "I already did everything you fucks told me to do! You're supposed to put me in Heaven with Jared for my service to you pompous, controlling bastards —"

"Danielle?" called out another voice, and Castiel realized he had become rather tense. It was a strange sensation he wasn't sure he understood or knew what to do with, but he cast it aside as a male came running through the tall grass.

The female turned around very quickly to face the male. "Jared," she whispered, and then she was off, running across the rolling landscape, the two souls racing toward each other and colliding in a mixture of arms grabbing and bodies rolling in the grass. Castiel quickly surmised that this must be an intimate greeting and departed, believing his duty to this particular soul had been carried out.

When he reported what had happened to Sariah, however, he sensed that this might not be the case. "That is most odd, the way this particular soul behaved," Sariah told Castiel. "I will report it to my superiors at once. Thank you for your service, Castiel."

Castiel watched the other angel fly away, and it suddenly occurred to him that this might not be the last he would see of this Danielle and her Jared. The realization was… unsettling.