Demon Seals

Chapter Eighteen: Campbell

I've had this chapter ready for a few days now, but I've hesitated in posting it because I wasn't completely certain I wanted to head in the direction this chapter will push things toward. I've planned this subplot for years, saw where the parts of it fit in with things I wrote in previous stories, but the fact that it ends up involving a character's potential for coming back to life... I just wasn't sure I should really pursue it, after all. Many of you have enjoyed the various characters I've created for this AU, but a recent voice has spoken out against the one that I seriously worked the hardest to make a fully-rounded character who would make a terrible choice in the name of faith in God. This new subplot would make obvious certain things I left ambiguous in previous stories regarding Danielle, but it's something I saw happening clear back when I was writing "Demon Virus". I don't want to make it seem like I care more about her than I do the Winchesters or their canon friends and family. They have more screen-time than my OC's; always have, and always will. Please believe me on this, no matter the role Danielle has played in Castiel's story thus far; not every part of Castiel's story will include her. The show has found many ways to bring back loved ones from the dead, and this was a potential way of coming back that I envisioned long before the first mentions of Purgatory in season 6, long before Rowena, long before Amara, all of it. I already established this particular idea in an earlier chapter, but I could have easily changed it or ignored it. I'm not going to.

I am posting this chapter because I decided the story it will tell is worth it. There are some amazing conversations and interactions that will come out of what I am going to set up in this chapter.

Sam knows that his mother was a Hunter, knows that Hunting was the family business. He knows, thanks to Ruby, that many of the Campbell's were killed after Mary's death. We know, thanks to season 6, that not all of them are gone. I'm taking advantage of that knowledge to push this subplot forward. I haven't decided if the Campbell's will take a larger role beyond this chapter in the current story, but their existence is being established, all the same.

Ruby's leads panned out, and as August passed into September, Sam found himself turning back to regular Hunting to pass the time. He still had nightmares aplenty, and he sometimes got so overworked that he needed alcohol to get any real sleep, but Ruby supported him and revealed herself more and more to be a suitable Hunting partner.

Well, maybe not at the moment, however.

"What's taking so long?" Sam shouted at the demon before shooting at the ghost trying to take him out yet again.

"I'm sorry, maybe you're the one who should've been lighting this fucker up!" Ruby yelled back.

"What, fire" — he shot the ghost again — "isn't your forte? What kinda demon-witch are you?"

"The kind that's gonna kick your ass if you keep sassin' me!"

"You started it!"

"Sam!" Ruby said exasperatedly. "How do you and Dean get anything done?" There was a clicking sound. "Got it!"

Seconds later, the spirit burned up into nothing.

Sam snorted and brushed his hair out of his face. "As Dean would likely say, 'with style and class'."

Ruby chuckled. "A quip for everything?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah, that was my brother, all the way."

Using his powers to heap the dirt back onto the grave once the fire had burned itself out, Sam and Ruby left the cemetery in a melancholy, but good mood.

At the end of September (Dean's been dead for five months), a new idea occurred to Sam. "You said that Azazel had a bunch of Hunters on my mom's side of the family taken out because of their wealth of knowledge about the Colt," he said abruptly to Ruby at their latest diner in Wisconsin.

Ruby frowned around a bite of fries. "Yeah…"

"Well, what if they had other knowledge, something that could help me bring Dean back?"

Ruby considered as she swallowed her food. "How would we go about figuring that out?"

Sam worried his bottom lip as he mulled it over. "Do you know if any of the Campbell's are still alive?"

"Some cousins, two or three times removed, I think," Ruby answered with a shrug. "But what makes you think any of them would talk to you?"

Sam smiled at the demon. "It's worth a try," he said in reply. "I've got nothing else to lose at this point."

He could feel Ruby's displeasure at the idea that there was nothing else for him, but ignored it. There was no way at this point to kill Lilith. The only other thing that really mattered, more than finding a way to kill Lilith, was having his brother back.

As it turned out, the remaining Campbell's were cagey, secretive, and really, really hard to track down. It took Sam a week to find any viable leads, and another three days before he managed to track down a man named Christian Campbell, a third cousin. Getting the man to stay still long enough for a talk was pretty damn hard since Sam didn't want to risk using his abilities, but eventually the two men found themselves facing each other in a field outside of Charlotte, Michigan. Ruby made herself scarce so she wouldn't "scare those trigger-happy, paranoid Hunters". Sam had to admit, sensing the distrust oozing from Christian's mind, that it had been the right call. No need to mess up what might be his only chance to find something, anything that could save Dean.

"You say you're related," Christian finally spoke up, not-so-casually placing his hands on his hips where a gun was clearly holstered. Sam kept his stance neutral.

"I'm the grandson of Samuel and Deanna Campbell," he replied. "Their daughter Mary was my mom."

Christian narrowed his eyes. "They're all dead," he said. "What proof you got?"

Sam carefully extracted the birth certificates, marriage licenses, and other paperwork he had put together to prove who he was from his laptop bag at his feet. He held out the folder for Christian to take. The man eyed Sam for a long moment before striding forward and snapping it out of Sam's hand. He immediately began looking through it, squinting up at Sam once or twice before closing the folder. "Looks legit," he finally admitted. "What business you got with the Campbell's all these years later?"

"Knowledge," Sam said. "I know the Campbell family has been Hunting for a long time, and I'm hoping to find some information that will help me."

"Help you how?"

Sam swallowed. "An innocent man was dragged to Hell. I need to know if there's a way to save him, bring him back topside, before he becomes a demon."

Christian frowned at Sam. "Lotsa innocents get dragged into the Pit after makin' Deals with Crossroads Demons," he said. "Did this man do the same?"

Sam looked down. "To save my own life, yes."

Christian gazed at Sam curiously. "How's this man related to you?"

Sam forced himself to hold Christian's gaze. "He's my brother."

Christian raised his eyebrows, but said nothing for several seconds. Finally, he huffed out a loud breath. "There might be somethin'," he said, backing up a couple steps. "I'll take a look, ask around, the works. It'll take me a couple days."

"That's fine," Sam said quickly even though part of him wanted to rage my brother has been in Hell for five months, I need him back, why can't you let me in so I can figure this out but he knew that would get him nowhere. "You have my number. I'll stay close by if that's fine."

Christian nodded after a moment. They said awkward farewells and carefully made their way back to their separate cars, parked on opposite ends of the field. Sam headed back to the small town of Charlotte and checked into the first motel he spotted.

"Any luck?" Ruby asked an hour later when she appeared with a bag of Chinese takeout.

"Maybe," Sam sighed. "Paranoid and distrustful doesn't even begin to describe that family, but the guy I spoke to promised to call me if he found anything useful."

"So we're hanging around for a couple days?"

Sam nodded, accepting the food Ruby handed him with a soft "thanks" and setting it by his laptop.

"What about witches?" he asked sometime later, food half-eaten and cold. "What kind of juice would it take for a witch to raise the dead in a non-zombie way?"

"A pretty damn powerful one," Ruby replied from the nearest bed, lifting the remote to turn down the volume on the show she was watching on the TV. "Really, you need a damn master in necromancy, which would easily be one who's been around at least a thousand years."

"You wouldn't happen to know of any, would you?" Sam glanced at Ruby, who scoffed.

"The coven I belonged to is long-gone," she said. "I have no way of knowing who is in charge of the Grand Coven these days, and I doubt they'd be excited to chat up a demon to help out a Hunter."

"Sorry I asked," Sam groused good-naturedly.

Ruby stuck her tongue out at Sam and increased the volume on her TV show again.

Forty-six hours later, Christian called Sam.

"I'm sorry, I looked into everything we got, but I couldn't find anything definite," the man said, actually sounding apologetic. "There are a handful of resurrection spells out there, but the firepower needed to use them is outside what any of us are capable of, and I doubt you'd be able to find a witch strong enough or so much as willin' to do your bidding. Add to that, the fact that your brother made a Deal…" He trailed off and then sighed. "It complicates things."

"Complicates them how?" Sam asked.

"A soul that's been promised to Hell, well," Christian whistled, "rulebook we've got says there's no bringin' back a soul that made a contract with a demon."

Sam closed his eyes. "Is there nothing I can try at all?"

Christian didn't say anything for several seconds. "There's a witch you could try an' track down," he finally said. "Name's Aneira. Legend has it that she's old, like over a millennia. Vain as can be, sucks out the life-force of pretty young girls to keep her perfect appearance up, but powerful. Real powerful. We've never been able to pin her down, and word is the psychic she most recently tethered herself to was killed a little over a year ago, so she might be too weak unless she's found a replacement."

"Tethered?" asked Sam. "What d'you mean by that?"

"It's old magic," Christian answered, "real old. Some witches have familiars to ground their sanity to, their powers, but Aneira?" He chuckled darkly. "She likes to find natural-gifted psychics and use their gift as a link to a supernatural 'well', if you will, to draw out power beyond what she's already capable of. She extends the psychic's life for as long as she can until they're burned out or go mad, then breaks the link and goes on the hunt for someone new to 'bond' with, if you can call it that." He sounded a little disgusted. "Still, even with her last grounding rod dead, she'd be quite a force to be reckoned with. 'S the best I got to offer, Sam."

Sam took a deep, steadying breath. "It's better than nothing," he said. "Thank you, Christian."

"You're welcome," Christian replied. "Take care, Sam. Call if there's anything else we could possibly help you with."

"You'd do that?"

"Yeah," Christian answered. "We might not really know each other, but you are family."

Family.

Dean is my family.

"Thank you," Sam said again before ending the call.

Aneira... Such an old, strange name.