Thanks to all that have read and reviewed and to Gredelina1 for all her help and support.

Chapter Twelve

Sam searched desperately through the veil, shouting anything he could think of about his location in hope, desperate hope, that someone would hear him and help. He had to get a message to Dean of where he was. Dean needed to know.

When he'd arrived in the hotel with Metatron, in the room full of books, he'd been panicked. When Metatron started talking, building up to a grand speech of defeat, Sam got pissed. He didn't want to hear whatever that creature had to say. He smiled his satisfaction as he flickered out of existence and into the veil, thinking of Metatron's capitulation.

The veil was noise and confusion, and he couldn't even be sure anyone was listening. He thought he heard someone shout his name, and he prepared to call out, when he was unceremoniously dragged out of the veil and back into that room. It was dizzying, as if someone attached a bungee cord to his chest and yanked. He came back to himself in the center of the small reading area of the room and Metatron was just laying down the last of a circle of salt, a circle surrounding Sam. Spread across the floor were the ingredients of a summoning spell. The amulet sat at the center.

"It's not as good as iron," Metatron admitted. "But I will get to that. This will hold you for now."

Sam cursed loudly and fluidly.

"Language," Metatron scolded. "You forget you are in the presence of the divine."

"I'm in the presence of an asshole," Sam spat. "There's nothing divine about you."

He shrugged. "That's your opinion. You are entitled to it, of course, even though you are a bottom-feeding mud monkey. Free will, you know, the thing that caused so much trouble in the first place."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Don't tell me this is going to be a bible study session. I'm already aware of what dicks you and your brothers are, not to mention your father."

Metatron snatched up a shotgun from a side-table and brought it up to aim at Sam. "That's God you're talking about."

Sam smiled smugly. "I am aware. The same God that left his children to stage an apocalypse and refused to help. The God that stood back and watched while the angels fell. He's not exactly a stand up dad, and I speak with authority on fathers."

Metatron seemed to be battling with himself. He clearly wanted to shoot Sam, but that would allow him to slip back into the veil and maybe get a message to Dean. He laid the gun down on the table again with a deep breath and shake of his head.

"I know what you're doing, and it's not going to work. I am going to keep you here… forever."

Sam shook his head. "No, you're going to keep me here til my brother comes and shivs your ass. There's a difference."

Metatron laughed hard and long. He clapped his hands against his things and wiped at his eyes. "You think your brother is going to save you! Oh, that's too precious. He can't save you, Sam."

"Underestimate him if you like. You wouldn't be the first person. Plenty have before, and Dean has wiped them off the planet, too."

Metatron chortled. "He can't come, because he's dead."

"You're lying." Sam's voice came out strong despite the fact he was chilled with fear.

"Am I? Look into my eyes and see the truth. I shot him. True, it will take him a while to die, it was a gut shot, but that just means he'll have time to really feel it before he slips into the veil. I've read that it's the most painful way to go."

Sam stared into his eyes and saw the truth there. Metatron had done it. Dean was dead or dying right now. Horror welled within him and he shuddered.

"That," Metatron said. "That right there is what I needed. That look of devastation in your eyes. That almost makes it worth being trapped in jail for all those weeks. I knew I would get out, and I knew I would kill a Winchester when I did. True, I had thought it would be you, but I wasn't expecting your own stupidity to do it for me. Imagine my pleasure when I heard Dean was human again, ready to be killed all over again."

"I will end you," Sam spat.

"And how are you going to do that?" Metatron asked. "Bore me until I take my own life? I'm an angel, you ass. You're a ghost, a trapped ghost at that; you have no power."

Sam's mind was reeling. Dean, dead. He couldn't bear it. Then a glimmer of hope came to him. Metatron said it was a gut shot. That meant Dean had time. Time for someone to get him to a hospital or Castiel to save him. He didn't have enough juice to bring Sam back, he'd said that, but maybe he would have enough to heal still. Sam took the hope and clung to it. Dean was okay. He would be fine. Someone would save him. It was the only outcome he could allow himself to believe in. Anything else would overpower him with rage and he would lose himself. Metatron would be all too happy if Sam became vengeful. It was the worst fate Sam could think of for himself, to become something that he would have once hunted.

He smiled grimly. "Power. That's what it all about really, isn't it? You think you have it."

"I do!" Metatron spat. "I expelled the angels from Heaven."

"Hmmm, that's not so much about the power though, is it? That was a snide, underhand trick played on someone who would have been your friend. Friend…" Sam laughed. "It's not just the power. It's because you wanted revenge. All those millennia, you were stuck here alone, cut off from your family. You must have gone mad."

"Family!" Metatron spat. "They ceased to be that the moment God singled me out to put down The Word. I had brothers before, but no one wanted to know me after I was chosen. I had no one anymore."

Sam laughed softly. "So, because you were lonely, you decided to screw Cas over and empty Heaven. How was that supposed to stop you being lonely?"

"It wasn't about being lonely anymore. It was about revenge. They ran me out of my home. They ostracized me because I had seen God. They deserved to fall." He sighed. "I don't expect you to understand. You've never been alone. You had your brother. The only love I ever knew was God's love, my grace. I had that and then he left and even my family turned against me."

He went on but Sam was only half listening. He was thinking of what Metatron had said about God's love. He made it sound like that love and grace were one and the same. Sam had always thought of it as the gift God gave the angels. His touch upon them, but now he was forced to think. Kevin had said the love that closes would open. Metatron had taken Castiel's grace—his love—for the spell. Was there a way to reopen Heaven with that grace?

"So," he said conversationally, "you took Castiel's grace, his love, because you were lonely."

Metatron shook his head. "Not just for that. I needed it for the spell, too."

He turned away from Sam and ran a finger along the spines of books on the shelf. He plucked a thick tome down out of the line and flipped it open. Sam saw that it was a copy of Paradise Lost. He turned the title page and Sam gasped as he realized what he was seeing. The middle of the book had been hollowed out and in the hole was a small glass vial filled with swirling blue-white light. Sam knew what it was as he had seen it before.

"That's grace," he said. "Castiel's, or have you been draining other angels too?"

Metatron smiled. "It's Castiel's. I admit I have siphoned from a few other angels, in retribution for crimes, but this is the one I care about. This is the key, but you will never understand how."

Sam thought he had a pretty good idea of how. He'd seen the souls freed and returning to their bodies. Would grace work the same way? He thought it would. That didn't solve the problem though. He had to get the grace from Metatron and release it, but he was trapped. Unless a strong breeze came along, to clear the salt, he wasn't going anywhere. He had to hope that Dean arrived soon, because he could, Sam was sure of that.

Metatron probably though he was insulting Sam, when a few minutes after his revelation about the grace he picked up a book and settled in the chair to read. Sam was relieved by the chance to think. He had to get to the grace, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't pass the salt line. The grace was resting on the side-table, out of reach of Sam, no matter how far he stretched. He had never cursed his existence as a ghost more.

Then an idea occurred to him. He couldn't reach the grace, but perhaps it could come to him. He had the abilities of a ghost, one of them was telekinesis. He had refused to practice that particular ability, because of the connotations it had with his past, but if ever there was a time to quit worrying about past mistakes it was now. He opened his hand and focused his mind onto reaching for the vial. That was how it had worked before. He'd focused on wanting the demons to remain in place, and it had worked. He hoped it would work the same way now.

Metatron seemed oblivious to what he was doing, all focus was on the book in front of him, or so Sam believed. That all changed after a few minutes focused attempts to draw the grace to him—and cursing the fact he'd not worked on the ability with Kevin—when Metatron looked up and smiled. "It won't work, Sam. You can huff and puff and try all you like, but you cannot summon grace like a teacup. It is God's grace, his love; such a thing is not tangible to someone like you."

Sam gritted his teeth and tried harder, not concealing the effort now that Metatron knew what he was doing. Metatron laughed at him, incensing Sam even more, but nothing happened to the grace. It remained unmoved on the table.

Suddenly, there was a rush of noise in the hall and the door flew open. Four people ran inside: Dean, Castiel and two others Sam didn't know but guessed they were angels. There was a rush of movement and Sam lost track of what was happening for a moment because he was so exalted at the sight of Dean, alive, though looking pale and in a bloodstained shirt.

"Dean!" Sam gasped.

Dean grinned at him. "Hey, Sammy. You okay?"

Sam had to smile. Dean was bloodstained and looking like he could sleep for a week but he was asking Sam (the ghost) if he was okay.

The two people Sam guessed were angels had Metatron pinned against the wall with angel blades pressing into his sides. Sam could see the cuts the blades made and the grace spilling out from the wounds. Castiel was facing him, and Sam knew at once that he'd missed more than Dean's healing.

"Ignias, Daniel," Metatron said, addressing the two strangers, "what are you doing here?"

"We had a little prayer session on our way over," Dean said happily. "Calling out to see if there was anyone else in the area that you'd screwed over."

"We answered," said the taller of the angels.

Metatron turned his attention to Castiel. "Human again, I see. You should have heeded my advice to live a life. It would have saved you so much pain."

"Cas, your grace!" Sam shouted. "It's there!"

Castiel nodded but he didn't turn. In his hand was a long, silver blade, and he brought it up to Metatron's throat. "I remember what you told me. To live a human life and to come tell you about it. I would like to extend the same offer to you, but I can't. I do not like to lie."

"Kill me," Metatron spat. "I know where I will go. I took down the Word of God."

Castiel shook his head. "No, we will not kill you. I have faith that our father created a place of peace for fallen angels, and I have no desire to allow you peace. I have a better idea." He pressed the tip of the blade into Metatron's throat slowly, drawing a line of blood and something else. Something was spilling from the cut, grace. One of the angels pinning Metatron in place handed Castiel a small, glass vial, and he caught the grace in it.

Castiel smiled grimly. "You are human now, Metatron, and you have a choice. Tell us how to reopen Heaven and we will let you live as a human and die as one, gaining peace. Lie, and you will be resurrected with each death to the end of time. You will never know peace."

Metatron was wheezing and groaning. The pain of two swords to the stomach and a cut throat had to be bad. "It's the grace," he said. "Release it and you can go home."

"Thank you." Castiel picked up the vial and examined it carefully before dropping it to the floor. He lifted a foot and crashed it down over the vial, breaking the glass. "Shut your eyes!" he commanded.

Sam saw Dean and Metatron obey, but he watched. The grace swirled and twisted in the air as it rose to Castiel. Bright white light spilled forth as Castiel spread his arms at his sides and opened his mouth. The light enveloped him, pouring into his open mouth. It lasted a matter of seconds, but Sam saw it all. He saw Castiel become an angel again, filled with God's love, and as the last of the light disappeared, he saw dark shadows of wings spread across the wall behind Castiel.

Dean lowered his arms from his eyes tentatively. "Is it done?"

"Yes," Castiel said. "It's done. It's over."

The two angels nodded, looking jubilant. "Do you feel it, brother?" one asked.

"Feel what?" Dean asked.

"Heaven," Castiel said serenely. "It is calling us home." He turned to his fellows. "Go. Return home. I will be with you soon."

They slowly extricated their blades from Metatron, making him wince and groan, and then disappeared with the familiar and welcome fluttering sound.

"Now," Castiel said, turning to Metatron. "We need to deal with you."

"You said you'd let me live," he said. "I told you how to open Heaven."

Castiel nodded. "You did, but… I lied."

He stepped back and allowed Dean to move in front of Metatron. "We had a long drive to talk," Dean said conversationally and Metatron cowered back against the wall. "And it gave us an idea." Out of his coat, he pulled a gun. ""You see, I owe you." He cocked the gun and Metatron gasped. "Our idea is this. You closed Heaven, denying peace for every person that died. You need to get a feel of that." He raised the gun, pointing it deliberately at Metatron's chest. "Personally, I'd love to send you to Hell, but my brother, awesome as he is, shut it up tight. Still, I'm pretty sure the angels are pissed enough to keep you out of Heaven, so we'll have to make it an earthbound Hell. See how you like it."

Metatron turned to Castiel. "Brother, help me!"

Castiel shook his head. "You are not my brother."

"Goodbye, Metadouche." Dean smiled grimly. "This is for Kevin." He pulled the trigger, sending a shot into Metatron's chest. The former angel screamed out and crumpled to the floor. "This is for Sammy." Another shot, another scream. "This is for Cas." Metatron howled as the bullet pierced his gut. "And this one," Dean growled. "This one's for me." There was no scream now as Dean put the final bullet into Metatron's temple.

So… Metadouche is dead and trapped on earth. That's all kinds of awesome, right? I figured it was a fitting fate for such a jerk. This is the last full chapter. There is a short epilogue to tie things up to come, and I will post that as soon as I can get around to editing it.

Until next time…

Clowns or Midgets xxx