Chapter 22 Tomorrow is a Good Day to Die
July 5, 2013. Litteris Hominae, Kansas
Chuck looked up at Mitch, his face hollowed and his eyes bleary. "How long was I out for?"
"Not that long this time," Mitch told him, glancing across the room where Deirdre sat hunched over a keyboard. "About five hours."
"Did it work?" Chuck looked down at his hand, the fingers bent and stiff and aching. He tried to flex them and winced at the sharp pain that filled his hand with the incautious movement. "Did I get the third trial? Any more defences?"
"Yeah," Mitch said soothingly. "You got most of it. You hungry? I'll get some food."
"Starving," the writer admitted. "And some painkillers, giant-economy size if we've got any left."
"Comin' right up." Mitch nodded as he got up.
It was hard to focus, his head was pounding and woolly at the same time, but he could see there was something wrong with the young programmer.
"What's going on?"
Turning, Mitch looked down guiltily.
"Nothing," he tried to brush off the question, feeling the contradictory flush rising up his neck as the word came out. "Nothing that you need to worry about," he amended, shrugging one shoulder.
"Come on," Chuck said, nervousness punching through the exhaustion. "What happened?"
"You had another vision," Mitch admitted. "It happened just as you were starting to come out of the – the trance."
"And?"
"It looks like the bad guys are still after you, man," Mitch said softly.
To his surprise, Chuck smiled. "So what else is new?"
"They're raising demons, over in Utah."
"I take it Dean and Rufus are working on that now?" Chuck leaned back in the chair, ignoring the growling of his stomach. Mitch heard it and took another step closer to the doorway.
"Yeah," he said quickly. "You need to eat. And sleep."
"And take a shower," Chuck agreed readily, rubbing his hands over his face.
"That too," Deidre commented from the other side of the room. "I can smell you from here."
Getting up slowly, Chuck nodded as Mitch left the room. A whole lot of things Mitch had left out and none of it good, he thought. He was stiff and sore from sitting in one place for too long and he shambled across the room to the bathroom gradually, feeling his circulation reluctantly returning. Pins and needles … everywhere. The hot water would help and food and a couple of hours of real sleep and then he'd have to grill Mitch on what had come out of him while he'd been in the fugue state.
July 6, 2013. West Keep, Kansas
Sam looked up as the door opened, mouth curling up in a surprised, one-sided grin as he saw the tall, dark-haired Jesuit come into the room.
Father Emilio closed the door behind him and walked to the bed, shaking his head in mock reproval as he looked at the hunter lying there.
"I think you are just trying to get out of doing any real work, Sam," he said, pulling a chair to the side of the bed. His expression became serious as he looked over the pallor of Sam's face.
"Yeah, that's me," Sam said, his gaze cutting away from that careful appraisal. "Looking for an out."
"How much worse was it this time?"
Sam swallowed nervously as the tickle in his chest became stronger. "A lot worse."
"The burning sensation is still there?"
"Not just in the blood vessels now," Sam confirmed, meeting the priest's eyes. "It's deeper – it feels deeper."
"Has it improved at all?" Father Emilio asked, leaning closer to him. "You look thinner."
Sam shook his head. "I can't eat. It smells … I just can't eat," he said, nose wrinkling up at the memory of some of the smells that had emanated from the food Merrin had brought to him. He knew the food didn't smell that way, not to anyone else, but his stomach had churned and his bile had risen in his throat and he couldn't force it down, no matter how much he knew he needed it. The drip was still in his arm, giving him the bare essentials but it wasn't enough.
"I'm getting weaker, I think," he added uneasily, his gaze dropping to his hand, fiddling with the edge of the bedcover. "I'm sleeping now but it doesn't do anything."
"The trials are more than a test of courage and skill," Father Emilio said slowly. "They are a test of fortitude and determination."
Sam glanced at him sourly. "Not going to be much good if I'm determined but too weak to lift the damned sword."
"I do not think it will come to that," the priest said, his gaze flicking to the wrapped sword that lay on the chest of drawers across the room. Sam followed the look. When he'd come to, the sword had been lying on the bed beside him, bright and polished. No one but him could touch it. Dean'd told him what he'd seen, the flames that had licked the blade and burned away the tarnish or whatever the black stains had been. He didn't like the symbolism. Neither, he suspected, had his brother.
"You read the last lot of translations from Chuck, didn't you?" Sam asked.
Father Emilio nodded. "Yes, I did."
"I'm not going to make it past the last trial, even if I succeed, am I?"
The priest was silent for several minutes, head bent as he considered how to answer that question. Sam watched him nervously. He'd come to value and appreciate Father Emilio's opinions and thoughts, had learned that the man didn't make snap judgements, about anything.
"And God said to Abraham, "Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you," Father Emilio said quietly. "And they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built an altar there and placed the wood in order; and he bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, upon the wood. And Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son."
Sam looked at him, his forehead wrinkling. "You're telling me this is a test of faith."
The Jesuit inclined his head slightly. "It is all a test of faith, Sam. Everything that you've been through, everything that every person goes through, a test of faith to the principles by which our characters – our souls – are developed." The priest sighed and leaned back in the chair. "Your choices, my choices, they come from how we perceive the world, ourselves, those that we profess to love or care about. The real choices we make test us every single day. Do we choose to honour our father and our mother? Do we choose to do our best? Do we choose truth over lies, right over wrong … and every choice determines the path we take, whether Destiny wills it or not."
"I've made a lot of bad ones."
"And you have been driven into many of those choices by circumstances beyond your control."
"No," Sam said, his voice hardening. "No, it wasn't circumstances. I –" He stopped, a sense memory of the heat of the Lake of Fire and the freezing cold of the Wastelands sending a shiver up his spine. "I don't know if it's the effect of the contract, or if I'm finally starting to accept what I'd done, but I did a lot of thinking, a lot of remembering, when I was moving through Hell." He looked up at the priest. "Everything I did, every action I took, those were my choices. I've accepted that, at least. My sin was pride, Emilio. Just like Lucifer."
Father Emilio looked at him carefully. "Don't look for similarities where there are none, Sam."
"I'm not," Sam said. "I failed my tests, failed the people who tried to keep me from doing that. Failed the whole goddamned world." He dragged in a breath and his lungs convulsed, a wracking paroxysm of coughing shuddering through his frame as he tried to find air to breathe. A gout of blood spattered across the covers and the floor as he turned his head away from the priest.
Father Emilio got up and got a glass of water from the nightstand, handing it to Sam as the spasms eased. Neither mentioned the blood, the priest pulling the soiled cover from the bed and picking up a clean blanket from the stack by the door. Sam swallowed the cold water slowly, feeling it trickle soothingly down the rawness of his throat, easing the pain that had been increasing gradually since he'd completed the second trial.
Finishing the water, he twisted to set the glass on the nightstand and looked back at the Jesuit. "It doesn't matter, not – not in the big picture, if I make it or not."
"Sam –"
Sam shook his head. "No. It doesn't. If I can do this, then it will have to pay for everything, and I hope –" he broke off, looking away, his throat working as he tried to find the words to explain to the priest what he'd realised the most important thing was.
Father Emilio watched him, seeing the hunter's frame tense up.
"I need my brother to see that I can do it, stick with it to the end and not fail," Sam said finally, his eyes closing. "Be able to think of me without being disappointed."
The priest sighed very softly. This then was what had been driving Sam to find the punishment he needed. He should have seen it earlier, he thought, but his observations of both men had been skewed by what he'd seen more clearly in the older Winchester, the load of responsibility Dean carried and the reasons behind it.
"Sam, Dean has never been disappointed in you," the priest said quietly. "His disappointment has always lain with himself. He believes he failed you, not that you failed him."
Sam turned his head, opening his eyes. "You don't know that, Emilio."
"I do," Father Emilio said, leaning closer to the younger man, his face filled with compassion. "I have seen it in your brother in every decision he's made, in every interaction he's had with not only you, but with the others." He shrugged, very slightly. "What did you think drove that responsibility for your well-being, Sam? For you to live your life as you saw fit, not as he does?"
Sam stared at him, unable to answer.
Litteris Hominae, Kansas
Jerome watched Dean from the end of the table, sitting back in his chair, fingers steepled as he contemplated the hunter who sat at the other end. Dean's short, dark-brown hair caught the overhead lights in pale glints as he bent over the thick wad of paper in front of him, his expression shadowed.
They had returned from the north east the day before, with the news that the dark Mother had been captured and the first-born werewolf destroyed. Maurice had also died, and while Dean had not gone into details of that, the legacy knew that he had killed him. Everyone knew it. It would've been an act of mercy, and on one level he was quite sure that the hunter knew that. On another, however, the act would remain in his memories, tormenting and haunting him, along with all the others.
He had the distinct feeling that Dean knew he was being pushed toward a particular purpose, once again. Chuck's vision had been frighteningly graphic in its detail. Dean, Rufus and Bobby were still reading it over, and along with the more vague insinuations of the instructions for the third trial and he thought that all three men were reluctant to discuss what would have to be done next.
Heaven was still manipulating. Camael had taken over the role of Voice and Scribe when Metatron had vanished from the divine plane. He and Jasper and Katherine had gone through the sketchy details of what legend and myth they had on the hierarchies and histories of Heaven with Penemue. The Qaddiysh had filled in what blanks he'd been able. None of them thought it was a coincidence, not even a happy one, that the archangel had found Father McConnaughey and given him the message about the Winchesters personally. The success of the Grigori in their endeavours seemed unlikely without some kind of help. They'd thought it had been help from Crowley, but now – now it looked as if Raphael had been cultivating them, and someone else was aiding them as well. The raising of the dead was not resurrection, for they had no souls, but purely reanimation, and was a form of black magic that had not been seen or practised reliably for almost the length of their time on this plane. The Haitians so-called zombies were a different matter altogether. As were the living dead, the creatures of Nintu. Not one of the chapters of the order had in their possession a spell or incantation or oblation or ritual to successfully reanimate a corpse – and the documents painfully retrieved from the Vatican hadn't either.
"You wanna say it, or do I have to?" Bobby asked in a low voice as Dean lifted his head and pushed the papers in front of him aside.
The third trial was as vague as the second one had been. Get into Hell, kill an archdemon and the gates will close. Nothing about getting out again but maybe that was the point. Dean rubbed a hand over his jaw, the prick of the three days' worth of stubble against his fingers reminding him that he hadn't had time for a shower or sleep since he'd driven back from Maine.
The vision.
That was something else.
His gaze shifted up the table to meet the eyes of the Jesuit priest who sat silently to one side of Jerome. "Anyone keeping track of Chuck's score on these? The whole ones and the bits and pieces?"
"Yes, we have been correlating the results," Father Emilio said carefully. "The visions have been correct ninety percent of the time."
"And the ten that doesn't make it?"
"Either you or your brother has changed something, something substantial and the result changes."
Dean dropped his gaze to the table, letting out a long breath. "Then I'll have to change it this time," he said to no one in particular. He pushed the chair back and got up, gesturing vaguely to the door. "Sam still over at the keep?"
Bobby nodded, mouth opening.
"I gotta see him, get some sleep," Dean cut him off before he could get a word out. "I'll be by tomorrow sometime," he added as he turned away and headed for the stairs.
Rufus glanced at Bobby and shrugged. They both knew that casual tone, the one that said he'd made up his mind and no one would change it now.
West Keep, Kansas
Sam opened his eyes as he heard the door open, brow creasing as he looked at his brother. Scabbed-over cuts striped one side of Dean's face, underlain with a fading rainbow of dark colours.
"What the hell happened to you?"
Dean's mouth quirked humourlessly to one side as he walked to the bed and dragged a chair over to sit in. "Not much. Werewolves, goddesses … same old."
"You look worse than I do."
"No one looks worse than you do," Dean contradicted him cheerfully, the lightness in his voice not reflected in his eyes. "I've seen month-old bodies that looked better than you do, Sammy."
"It's getting better," Sam said defensively and Dean watched his gaze cut away. He nodded, letting it go.
"Good." He leaned back in the chair, looking at his brother. "What'd the doc say?"
Sam shrugged slightly, careful not to set off another coughing attack. He wasn't sure if Dean'd heard the one that had shaken through him a few minutes earlier.
"He doesn't know what's happening," he told him. "They've done a million tests and it all comes up the same big fat zero."
"You strong enough to do the third trial?"
For a moment, Sam didn't respond, staring down at the smooth white sheet that covered him. "Doesn't matter," he said finally. "This will kill me if I don't continue."
"You read Chuck's latest bird's eye into the future?"
"Yeah."
The silence in the warm room stretched out a little, then a bit further, both men thinking of what the prophet had seen, neither willing to talk about it.
"Father Emilio seems to think that I can change it, do something that'll change it just enough so that rest will veer off on a tangent," Dean offered a few minutes later. The still warmth of the room was lulling his brain, and he needed to keep moving, at least until he could crash. He stood up and looked around the large square room restlessly.
Sam watched him, seeing his discomfort and beneath that, more subtly, that his brother had already made a decision about what he was going to do. The mention of the Jesuit priest made him wonder if Father Emilio had been right about Dean. He didn't know what to think about that, it meant that some of his memories weren't accurate, some of the things he'd thought, had done, had been for the wrong reasons. Again. He pushed the thoughts aside and watched Dean stretch, the casual feline grace almost but not quite hiding the tension.
"We couldn't buck the last vision," he said matter-of-factly. "In fact, it went down exactly the way Chuck saw it."
"We didn't have a full chapter, or section, or whatever the hell you want to call it, then."
"I don't think that matters much." He dragged in a breath cautiously. "What are you going to do?"
Dean turned to face him, and Sam's heart sank as he saw the green eyes lit up. Every single time his brother looked like that, all hyped and glowing from the inside out with some idea, it meant he was going down to the wire.
"Not sure yet," Dean said, catching a glimpse of Sam's doubt and trying to wind down the volume on the charge of prickling energy that was fizzing through him. "I got a few ideas. I want to go see Boze first, check out some things with him."
Lie number one, Sam thought, his eyes narrowing slightly. Whatever Dean wanted to talk to Boze about, he didn't need to go up there again after just coming back.
"You get some strength back, okay?"
"Sure, yeah," Sam agreed automatically, and Dean walked to the door.
"Dean?"
His brother stopped and turned around, one brow lifted.
"It might be that a sacrifice is necessary to the closing of the gates, you know?"
The energy vanished, or darkened somehow, Sam thought, looking at his eyes.
"Then you gotta pull the plug, Sam," Dean said tightly.
"I can't. And you know that." He shifted against the pillows tucked up behind him. "It's okay, you know. I think I'm starting to understand this – all of it."
"What the fuck does that mean, Sam?" Dean strode back to the bed, face thunderous and the lit-up green eyes almost black. "You think this was pre-destined? That you won't find what you're looking for without it?"
"I feel okay about it, that's all." Sam shrugged, unwilling to talk about what Father Emilio had said to him yet.
"I don't!"
"I can't help that."
"No." The energy ran out as quickly as it had gathered. "No, you can't. So don't throw it all in without giving me a chance to do something, alright? A chance to change something."
"I just don't see the point of both of us going down at the same time," Sam said, risking a look at Dean's face.
Dean looked down at the floor. Somewhat ironically, he thought, he felt the same way. The difference was, if he could change something, something that would have an impact on what Sam did or what happened, his brother might be able to survive to have a life. He didn't think he could explain that to Sam. Explain how it could work for one of them, at least.
"I don't either," he said slowly. "Just – gimme some time, okay? Before you put your head on the chopping block? Just some time."
Sam's face screwed up as he tried to work out what his brother had in mind, what he was going to do.
"I will – if you promise me you won't do something stupid."
The fleeting smile that crossed Dean's face wasn't reassuring. "Yeah, I can promise that."
The apartment was dark but warm, the stone and concrete walls and floor radiating the day's heat back into the rooms. He left the lights off, moving around with an easy familiarity.
A single beam of moonlight lit the bathroom and he stripped off, stepping under the cold water without waiting for it to heat up. The water warmed gradually and the droplets beat down and in the insular world within the rushing flow, he felt himself get clearer.
They thought he was suicidal but he wasn't. There were just some things he could do and other things he couldn't and all he was doing was prioritising. He couldn't take his brother's place. He couldn't even go with him. But he could make a big noise elsewhere. That was something he could do.
Boze had promised everyone he could spare. Tim and Ty had offered the same. Between the northern camps, there would be about fourteen hundred, he thought. Franklin had already volunteered and most of his soldier-boys had signed themselves up. He didn't think he'd get more than that from here. It couldn't be a front assault, but it was going to have to be. He wanted everyone looking at him and no one paying attention to what his little brother was doing.
His palms flat against the smooth, cool tiles, Dean leaned against the wall, head bowed under the spray. It wasn't getting easier. Not at all. He tipped his face into the water, sluicing the last of the soap from his skin and hair and turned off the taps, reaching for the towel, trying to keep his mind on what he had to do.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, he looked absently around the room. It was bland, he thought tiredly. The very faint odour of the dirty clothes he'd shucked at the end of the bed was the only thing he could smell in here now. He looked at the nightstand, the bottle and glass that sat there, mutely accusing.
The bottle had come out again, after a long period where he hadn't wanted it, at least, hadn't wanted the smothering amnesia it could offer. It'd been a decision he hadn't questioned. It let him get to sleep, mostly.
In the night he would wake, listening, for the soft whisper of breath. It wasn't just clean sheets and a bed that fooled him into waking and listening for that now, it didn't matter where he slept or tried to sleep, he'd come to consciousness, listening, and when memory seeped in, along with the certain knowledge that he was not going to hear that, that he would never hear that again, it crucified him, each and every time.
It was getting harder. And the whiskey didn't really do much these days.
It hadn't been until someone had removed everything from the apartment that he'd realised what he'd been doing, just waiting, not admitting to anything, everything normal, everything fine here, look, there's her coat, the book she'd been reading, the scent of her on the sheets and towels and on her clothes in the closet and he thought he'd spent a lot of time using those subliminal clues to kid himself that it was a temporary thing, nothing permanent, gone up to see Renee, maybe or down to look at the cotton gins and mills in the south, back soon, anytime soon.
It was much harder now. And the only real antidote he had was doing something. Moving. Taking on whatever he could. He had to figure out a way to change what was going to happen. Chuck's words on the smooth white page rose into his thoughts and he felt himself tense … Sam's body arched upward and backward, straining as if he were being pulled from every direction at once, light flickering under his skin, pulsing and zigzagging crazily, a cartoonish view of electrocution but there was nothing funny about it. He collapsed to the ground as the light died, and his eyes stared sightlessly, limbs sprawled in the careless contortions of death, only feet away from the charred bones of the archdemon …
Dragging in a deep breath, Dean pushed the memory of that passage aside, scrambling for something to replace it with, a plan, an idea … anything to block out the morbid finality of those words.
In the vision, Chuck had seen Sam go through the open gate and into Hell, had seen him confront the archdemon and battle with him. It hadn't been the fight that had killed his brother. It had been contract that was inside of him. Burning through the last of the demon blood? Or through Sam's soul? Chuck didn't know. He didn't know if anything he could do would change that outcome.
Looking around the room again, he wondered if it was something Sam would do – or could do. Some act that would make the final sacrifice unnecessary. He could ask the priests about it.
He stretched out on the bed, staring up at the ceiling in the darkness, aware that he was still listening.
July 10, 2013. West Keep, Kansas
He didn't want to die. For the first time in a long time, maybe even since the moment his brother had dragged him out of the apartment in Palo Alto, he wanted to live. Felt like he had something to live for. God's sense of humour, Bobby said on numerous occasions. Don't know what you've got till it's gone.
He didn't want to die but there wasn't going to be a choice about that and even if there had been some way to walk away from what he'd started, he couldn't this time. Running was what he'd done in the past. He wasn't going to do it again.
He sat up in the bed, pushing the covers to one side. The dizziness was a permanent condition now, maybe a lack of blood pressure, he thought tiredly. He felt weak all the time as well. He'd been sleeping again, but it hadn't helped. His dreams had been vivid and almost three-dimensional, not nightmares, not precisely, they'd been memories more often than not.
They'd started out with the memories of a few years back, driving with his brother, hustling pool, lying back on the hood of the car, staring at the night sky in some godforsaken stretch of nameless desert. Then he'd dreamed of Jess, their apartment, talking to her, listening to her, watching her. And then they'd gone further back. Motels. His brother. His father.
He didn't know what it meant, the dreams of his life, moving backward through time. Most hadn't been of the frightening or dangerous moments. They'd been the ordinary times, the times in between. And when he woke from them, he felt a sad kind of peace, a gentle melancholy that he'd forgotten about all those times. All those good times.
His feet touched the floor and he stood slowly, waiting for the unsteadiness to pass, leaning back against the edge of the bed. He was going to miss the order, he thought, trying to block out the churning nausea that was filling his throat. Miss the nights of reading and tracking the answers through the countless volumes of lore and knowledge. Miss looking up and seeing Marla nearby, the warm golden light of the library's lamps gleaming on the shining dark curtain of her hair. Miss the arguments with Jerome and Jasper, the discussions with Marla and Oliver. The short sojourn he'd had with them had given him a glimpse of another life and it'd been a life he'd wanted, a life he could see himself embracing.
The trembling in his legs had stopped, the dizziness had backed off and he felt his stomach settle down, swallowing against the taste at the back of his throat, forcing it down. The archangel's sword was bundled in silk and an outer leather wrapping, sitting on the low chest of drawers to one side of the room. He walked to it slowly and looked down at the shape.
Going into Hell, alone. He'd be protected by the talismans, as he had been before. The demons probably wouldn't see him. The archdemons would, he knew. There wasn't anything on the tablet about protecting him from the draining power of the fallen angels. He picked up the sword, feeling the weight in the muscles of forearm and bicep and shoulder. A few weeks ago, he wouldn't have noticed that weight. A few weeks ago, he'd've been able to move fast. He thought briefly of Cerberus, jumping onto the guardian's back and hacking off the head.
The third trial was killing an archdemon. Asmodeus had almost caught him. And Baal was still in there, somewhere. He had no idea of what he was going to do if they were together.
Worry about it when it happens, he told himself sharply, putting the sword down and picking up his jeans. He needed to get going, needed to call Cas.
Jimmy spun around on the stairs, staring at the man who stood two steps down, whose features were a little like his own, just enough familiarity that he knew who it was.
"Go away," he said sharply, turning away and starting to climb the stairs again.
"Jimmy, I need your help," Castiel said bluntly, lifting his hand. The man was held immobile in mid-stride.
"You promised to take care of my family, Castiel," Jimmy said, his voice low and angry. "You promised that no harm would come to them."
"I know," the angel said, lowering his hand. "They are alive, Jimmy. Alive and safe, for the moment."
Novak looked back over his shoulder, his eyes narrowed in disbelief. "Where? What do you mean – for the moment?"
"You know what's happening here," Cas told him as Jimmy turned to face him. "I need you."
"I don't give a tiny rat's ass what you need, Castiel," he said thinly. "What about what I need? What about Claire and Amelia?"
"I told you, they're safe," the angel said. "But I can't guarantee that they will remain safe unless I can help the Winchesters close the gates, and defeat the Grigori. If either Hell or the fallen gain victory here, no one will be safe."
"You know, I listened to you before and my wife was possessed by a demon," Jimmy said, looking down at him, his face taut with the memory. "I want some real proof that you're telling the truth this time."
"Give me your consent and I will show you."
"Now?"
Cas nodded, watching him. For a moment, Jimmy looked back at him, uncertain about believing him. He was nothing as the angel's vessel, locked away in his mind, not living, not dying, not anything. But if he could see them again, just see them and know that they were alright … he closed his eyes.
"You have my consent."
Cas dissolved and Jimmy's body lit up, the light filling him and transforming him, pushing his awareness of his body aside, taking over his mind, shutting him away.
The angel looked down as the light faded, his expression smooth and blank. The air popped as it rushed to fill the space the man had occupied.
Marsh Harbor, Bahamas
Cas stood on the sandy dune, overlooking the long white beach, the warm breeze laden with salt ruffling his hair as he relinquished partial control over the soul whose vessel he shared.
At the end of the beach, an old house stood, built of coral and stone and cement, with deep verandas and lush greenery surrounding it. Jimmy looked at the two figures walking slowly along the sand, their long blonde hair lifted by the light wind, their gazes on the shore. His wife and daughter looked healthy, he thought, looked tan and fit and – and – safe.
Claire lifted her head and gestured to the pier that jutted out into the shallow, jade-green water and Jimmy saw Amelia nod, following her daughter more slowly as Claire raced ahead.
Can they see us?
No.
Will you bring me here, to see them, from time to time?
He felt the angel's deep sigh and waited.
Yes, if that is what you want.
Watching Claire pull up the simple crab-pots and fish traps that had been set out from along pier's edge, Jimmy nodded to himself. Yes. That's what I want.
Sam glanced up the corridor and stepped out of the room, the sword thrust through his belt and bouncing lightly against his leg as he walked toward the stairs. Dean couldn't help him this time, and it would be better if he could get out of here before his brother was aware of his plan to leave.
"Cas? Cas, can you hear me?"
The sound of wings behind him was a bare flutter, the air shifting as he turned to see Jimmy standing there.
"He consented?" Sam asked, surprised.
Cas inclined his head slightly. "What do you want, Sam?"
"I need a gate."
Cas' eyes widened fractionally. "Where's Dean?"
"He's got other things to do," Sam said, taking a step toward the angel. "And I have to do this alone."
"Not entirely alone," Castiel told him, reaching out to grip his shoulder.
The air sighed in the hall, a swirl of dust motes sparkling faintly as they were lit up by the sunshine coming through the window at the far end.
Strawberry Peak, Utah
The cavern was deeper than it was high or wide, and the women crouched together at its end, close by the small tunnel that led further into the mountain. The air was cold and damp and they shivered in the shapeless shifts they wore, pressed against one another for warmth.
Jane looked down at the woman next to her. She'd hardly spoken, since they'd left the basement, her long hair hanging over her face most of the time. In the fitful, flickering light of the jerry-rigged torch – a handful of material wrapped around an old piece of timber hoarding, found as they'd made their through what might've once been a mine – Jane saw the pock-marks over the woman's arms, and lifting the torch, up along her neck. The skin there was mottled with bruising, older, greys and yellows and fading green.
"What happened to you?" she asked, and the woman lifted her head, seeing the direction of her gaze and following it.
"I don't know," she said quietly.
"Those aren't from the blood-drawing," Jane said, peering closer at the rows of needle punctures. "They're everywhere."
The woman drew away a little as she nodded. "I don't know," she said again.
"You don't remember?"
"I don't remember anything."
Jane opened her mouth to question her further and closed it abruptly as she heard the scrape, far down the tunnel they'd come up from last night. She got to her feet fast, gesturing sharply with the torch to the black hole on the other side of the cavern. The woman rose, pulling the girl next to her up as well and the others looked around, hearing another noise and following Jane down into the darkness of the tunnel mouth.
It was a maze of tunnels and caves, some man-made; exploratory mines, old mines that had been worked out … some were naturally formed caves and passages and drop shafts. The air moved slightly against her face and the flame of the torch bent. She turned to the movement and followed it along another narrow slit, shielding the light with her body as much as possible.
Behind them, there was a cough and the sound of footsteps.
"Hey, think they've been through here!"
The shout, still far off but a lot closer than any of the other searcher's noises had been, pushed them all into walking faster, following the twisting passage, glancing fearfully over their shoulders.
"We might have to get rid of that light." The woman whispered to Jane as she hurried beside her.
"We do, and we'll die in here," Jane whispered back, curving her arms and shoulders around the torch more tightly. "We can't lose it."
"If they see us, we'll die anyway."
Jane flicked a glance at her profile. She was thin, thinner than any of them, her belly huge and swollen, drum-tight in front of her. In the inconstant light, she saw that her jaw was clenched hard.
July 11, 2013. West Keep, Kansas
Dean stood in the doorway, eyes narrowed as he scanned the empty room. Clothes, sword, brother … all gone. Goddammit, Sammy, he thought furiously, turning away and striding down the hall, couldn't have given me a few more days?
He knew the answer to that question. Sam didn't think he had that many more days. It meant he'd have to think of something else, because there was no way Boze would be ready yet. He turned left into the main hall and headed for the doors, ignoring the people he passed, attention focussed inward.
He was halfway across the bailey when the memory hit him, his father's voice a deep, dark burr in the mostly dark room. Sam had been ill and he'd been sleeping in the main room, a bed made up on the long over-stuffed sofa. His father had been telling him about ancient battles, Troy, and Athens and … Thermopylae. Three hundred men against the army of Persia, an army of more than ten thousand. John Winchester had failed his children in many areas, but story-telling hadn't been one of them.
"Xerxes and his army had to come through the pass, and there was just the one road they could travel on. Leonidas chose his ground carefully, the narrowest section, between high mountains and the sea and he ranged his archers on the high ground on both sides, and his soldiers along the mouth, and when the army attacked, the piles of their dead became a barrier itself, that they had to climb over or drag aside to get through to the soldiers fighting them," that dark voice had said softly next to him. He remembered closing his eyes, imagining the Persians with their elephants and their wagons, unable to go forward or back, held off by the fierce warriors of Sparta.
Franklin looked up as Dean barrelled into workshop. "Where's the fire?"
"I need a truck, Stingers, mines, C4, detonators, a Stig, half a dozen M60s and as much ammo as the truck'll carry," the hunter said tersely, looking around the packed walls of the long room. "And I need it now."
"Boze said he'd be –"
"I know," Dean cut him off. "Sam's gone. I'm out of time."
Franklin put down the tools he was holding and nodded once, going to the intercom that sat to one side of the long bench. "Willis, get everyone. We're leaving."
"No," Dean snapped, looking at him. "I can do this alone."
Franklin's face reddened with anger. "The fuck you will, son," he growled, face screwing up as he straightened up and looked pugnaciously at the younger man. "I know what you're thinking, but all those men – they died holding that pass."
"My point," Dean said turning away from him. "It'll be an ambush, not a holding front. And I'll have a better chance of surviving without anyone else to worry about."
"Too bad," Franklin grunted, pulling off the leather apron he wore and tossing it onto the bench. "You've got company whether you want it or not."
Dean looked back at him as he walked to the door of the workshop. He could hear the rumble of engines now, deep-noted diesels, their low thunder bouncing off the hard stone and concrete walls of the keep.
"Franklin, I need you, and everyone else here, to protect these people," he tried again, shoving down a growing push of anger.
Franklin ignored him, going to the phone in his office. "Bobby? Get word to Boze, we're leaving now. Yeah. No. As many as he can find, and as fast as he can get there," he said shortly into the handset, turning to glance over at Dean. "Yeah, that's about it. Not Custer. Thermopylae." He hung up with a soft snort.
"We'll be ready in twenty minutes," he told Dean. "Bobby, Jackson and Riley'll hold the fort here."
Looking at him, Dean felt his anger drain away. "I gotta move fast."
"We'll keep up, don't you worry," Franklin promised sourly. "Willis' got a truck loaded, we've been thinking about what we might need for a few days now. Short, red-haired kid. You can't miss him."
Dean swung away, heading for the door. Franklin called out and he stopped by the frame.
"Not a last stand," he said, his gravelly voice reaching across the room. "We just have to hold them till the rest can get to the plain. Right?"
The hunter's mouth lifted on one side slightly. "Whatever we have to, Franklin. No guarantees."
He walked through the door and left the ex-soldier glowering after him. They'd need plenty of explosive, Franklin thought to himself as he turned back to the phone to let Rufus know of the change in plans. He'd drag the crazy sonofabitch out of there himself if he had to, but they'd have to make it hard work for anyone to follow them, and they only needed a few days.
Rufus slammed the phone down and spun around, half-running to the hall and snatching up his gear bag. He had twenty minutes to find the others and get their gear sorted out. He should've known the dumbass would want to take the fight out of here, the losses of the last engagement hadn't been bad but Dean'd felt every single one.
Seeing Billy and Lee walking down the long hall that led to the kitchens, he hailed them and told them to get everyone together, ready to go in fifteen minutes. The young hunters split up and bolted, Billy going to find Herb and Win and Elias, Lee heading in the other direction to round up the rest of the trainees, Kelly, Nate and Peter. Neither young man appeared to be too worried about what might turn out to be a suicide mission, Rufus thought, following the echoes of Lee's rapidly receding footsteps to the stairs. They had plenty of ordnance, plenty of ammunition. But the odds were bad.
Jackson met him on the keep steps, his face hard and stony. "What's the story?"
"Sam's gone, we're heading out," Rufus told him, swinging the heavy gun bag over his shoulder. "We'll try and get up to the high pass and hold them there until Boze and Tim can get their people over from Michigan."
"You need more people," the farmer said, watching the trucks roll through the bailey.
"No argument, but what we got is what we got." He flicked a glance back at the keep, towering up grey and solid behind them. "You don't hear from us, you get everyone into the walls and you button this place up tight and you prepare for an attack."
Jackson nodded. "We'll be ready."
"You better be," Rufus warned him. "Won't be no cavalry left, Jackson. Just you and the folks here. So keep 'em safe."
He turned away, walking down the wide steps and waving an arm as Jack pulled up beside him, the canvas-covered truck low on its axles. Climbing up into the cab, Rufus lifted a hand and the truck pulled away, belching black smoke as it crawled after the others through the narrow tunnel.
"What's going on?" Lachlan Miller stopped beside Jackson, glancing at him and back at the trucks.
"Grigori army has started to move and Dean's going to stop them," the leader replied sharply.
"Doesn't look like many are going?"
"No," Jackson said caustically. "And they'll probably all die tryin' to save our hides."
The carpenter said nothing, watching the trucks edge their way out of the courtyards and through the gates. He turned away and walked back across the bailey.
Cache Valley, Utah
The landing was harder than before, and Sam staggered slightly to one side, his hand snapping out to grip the priest's shoulder as Father McConnaughey gasped and stumbled forward. Castiel steadied them both.
"Where are we?"
"This is the Cache Valley, in Utah," Cas said, looking around warily.
"Utah?" Father McConnaughey said, his gaze flicking from side to side. "Why Utah?"
"In 1863, there was a massacre here," the angel said, gesturing around them. "It opened a gate. The gate is still here."
"But the Grigori base –"
"It is a hundred miles north of here," Cas cut him off. "We do not need to worry about that right now." He looked at Sam. "Do you have the ingredients for the spell?"
Sam nodded. "Yeah, takes about an hour to open the gate."
"I cannot go with you."
"I know," Sam said, kneeling to unzip the bag he carried and unload the bowl and herbs and crushed powders he needed to force the gate open. He and Marla had separated all the available information on the different ways to open the gates, both the gates to this plane and the doorways from the borderlands. He pushed aside the anger he still felt at not knowing any of them back when he needed the knowledge the most and set everything out carefully, narrowing his concentration to what he was going to have to do.
"Sam."
He looked up at the angel, seeing his indecision, the uncertainty in the dark blue eyes.
"Cas, if you can get any help from Michael, we could use it."
"I'll try."
The sound of beating wings filled the open valley, then vanished. Father McConnaughey looked down at the preparations.
"Can I help?"
"Not right now," Sam said, his gaze checking over what he'd brought. "I think I have to finish the third trial before I – before we can go any further."
He looked back at the priest, sighing inwardly as he saw the concern in his face. "If I don't come back, pray to Cas," he said firmly. "He'll get you back to the keep."
Father McConnaughey nodded, his gaze dropping to the talismans around the younger man's neck. He reached up and lifted a cross from his own, drawing it from beneath the black coat he wore and pulling the chain over his head. Sam frowned as he handed the cross to him.
"Not just a symbol of faith," Father McConnaughey said, gesturing to it as Sam lifted the pendant to examine it. "Also of protection and, I believe, a source of strength, if you can access it."
"Do you know how?"
Father McConnaughey smiled, somewhat wryly. "I held it while I prayed for help," he said frankly. "And help came, in one way or another."
"Never say no to help," Sam said, drawing the chain over his head and settling the cross under his shirt.
"A wise decision."
July 12, 2013. Strawberry Peak, Utah
Jesse glanced around the room, searching the shadows that lingered in the corners for any possible watcher. It was empty, the thin light that crept in through the cracks between the thick curtains revealing a long, mostly bare room, with floor-to-ceiling windows running along one wall, incompletely covered in heavy brocade, and a grand piano with at least an inch of dust sitting over its broad, flat surface. And a frame, hung on the wall opposite the piano and loosely draped with a black, silk cloth.
He hurried across the dull parquetry floor to the hidden mirror. Julian and the Russian had completed the spell to restore the pieces two days ago. One day ago, in the middle of the night, the mirror had spoken to him.
"Hubertus?"
He was afraid. Afraid of the mirror, of the men who ran this place and had repaired it, afraid the armies of the dead he'd brought here, and the army of the living with their flat, black demon eyes. None of them could hurt him, he knew. None of them could touch him. But he was afraid of what they would do to everything else.
Jesse.
"I'm here," the boy whispered, sinking down to the floor against the wall, his eyes closing.
I was wrong.
Jesse frowned. "About what?"
About everything, the soul of the cambion murmured and he wasn't sure he was hearing that soft sighing breath with his ears or in his mind, the way he'd heardseenfelt Sabrine's mental touch.
"I don't understand."
Whatever else we are, Jesse, we're human. I thought we were more than that, gods, demi-gods … but we're not. Human. Made to need each other.
Jesse still didn't understand. He twisted around, looking up at the bottom of the frame. "What's wrong?"
I'm lonely. The thoughtwordsidea held a feeling of amusement, edging the melancholy. I've lived alone my entire life but this is the first time I've ever been lonely.
"I'm still here."
Yes, you are. The feeling that imbued that was warm with regard, with care. Jesse, you have to find a way to get me out of here.
"The angels," Jesse said softly. "They're looking for the spell to free you."
They will never find it. The thought was lit with certainty. It is the antithesis of what they are, what they understand. The order, the order will have it.
"I can't see them any more," Jesse admitted. "They took the tablet and the prophet."
… At least they are protected then.
Jesse felt the deep sigh and sorrow that leaked from the mirror above him.
Jesse, what are they doing, the angels?
"They've brought the dead out of their graves," the boy said slowly, an icy shiver running up his spine again as memory returned. "They're possessed by demons. They captured one of the other angels, and put a spell on him. He opened the gate and let the demons come out."
The mirror remained silent and Jesse swallowed a little nervously. "The vampire escaped and took the people he changed. He took some of the women as well."
The feeling of amusement came from the mirror, a breathless chuckle against his mind.
"Is that funny?"
Oh yes, that's very funny.
"Why?"
You'll understand, one day, Jesse. What else?
"They are going to make the demons attack the people, in Kansas."
Are they now?
Jesse felt the sudden interest from the cambion, a surge in energy. "Is that good?"
It might work for us. It might … free us.
"How?"
What are your orders? Yours and the others?
"We have to go with them, across the mountains. To clear the roads, to make sure they can get through."
Yes. Will Julian take the mirror?
"I don't know, he hasn't said so."
…
"What?"
…
"Hubertus?"
Either way. Either way it will come to our advantage. There was a quiet certainty, leeching out from the thought and filling him, soothing him.
Before you leave, come then and tell me what is to happen. I think I can still call out, even from in here. All of us together. Yes, come here and tell me when you are about to leave, Jesse.
"Alright."
Jesse …
"Mmm?"
Keep yourself safe. Flee if you must.
"Will I see you again?"
Yes. I am certain of that.
"I've gotta go."
Remember what I said, Jesse. Keep safe.
"I will."
He got to his feet and walked to the door, glancing back over his shoulder at the darkly shrouded frame as he left the room. It was creepy. But it was good as well. Good to hear his friend. Good to know he wasn't dead. He kept hoping that he would find Alison again too. He missed her terribly.
He could hear the stamping of thousands of feet, even from deep within the house. They would be leaving soon. Marius said that there were more than ten thousand in the army they'd raised. The line would be more than eight miles long, where the roads narrowed through the passes. He couldn't imagine that many, altogether with the trucks and tanks and wagons pulling the heavy artillery.
Camp Tawas, Lake Tawas, Michigan
Renee stopped in the hall and leaned against the wall, feeling the distinctive movement in her abdomen and resting one hand against the taut skin. Too early, she told herself firmly, hoping that the twins she was carrying weren't going to follow the tradition of their older siblings and come before they were due.
The feeling subsided and she straightened up, taking a deep breath. Just another week, she told them silently. One more week and you can come out anytime you like, but give us another week.
Boze looked up as she walked into his office, his eyes narrowing slightly as he took the pinched look around her eyes.
"What's wrong?"
"Indigestion, I think," she said lightly, passing him a cup of coffee and easing herself slowly into the comfortable chair opposite the desk. "Are you ready?"
"Vince called in last night, got through on the SSB," he said, picking up the cup. "They're heading east and south, looking for the naval bases."
He swallowed a mouthful of the black liquid and sighed. "We'll be heading out at dawn."
Renee nodded. Bobby's call had been expected, they had been gleaning from the army bases and National Guard training camps for the last three weeks, but the news that Dean had left, was going to try to hold the army in the mountains, had accelerated everything.
She'd wished he'd come here, after Alex had died, but she'd known that he wouldn't, couldn't share his grief with anyone else, even those he trusted. He'd been the first person she'd seen after the virus had decimated her small town, and he'd nearly run her over when she'd raced onto the road, knowing it was a risk, that he could've been one of the monsters that she'd seen wandering through the town, but too desperate then to care. She remembered the quiet wariness in his eyes as he'd looked at her and offered the water, Rufus standing behind and to one side of him, both of them with their fingers on the triggers of their guns.
She still couldn't believe that the population of the keeps in Kansas had turned against him, couldn't understand how it was they didn't know they'd all be dead if it weren't for him.
"How long do you think this is going to take?" she asked, knowing the question was a fool's question, needing to ask it anyway.
Boze smiled gently at her. "I don't know, babe. If we can get there fast enough, catch them as they're coming down, we might be able to flank them, get behind them. But if we're can't, and they get down to the plain before us …" he trailed off uncomfortably. More than ten battalions, Chuck had written. No idea how much more, but the Qaddiysh that had been taken had supposedly been able to command over a hundred thousand demons, and the cemetery of Arlington held over three hundred thousand graves, the math was huge, frightening. He didn't want to think about it until he was there, and could see what few advantages the terrain and the situation might give them. He certainly couldn't offer a hope to the woman opposite him, no matter how much he wanted to.
Renee watched the expressions cross his face, expressions that she knew he thought he was hiding from her. He was disarmingly oblivious to the expressiveness that made him transparent to anyone watching him. She no longer allowed him to play poker for anything other than matchsticks because he'd lost so much of their personal stocks of booze playing for bourbon.
He looked up at her. "Dean's sneaky, you know that," he offered. "He'll figure out some way of getting on top of them."
"I know he will," she said, with more conviction that she felt. "He's bucked the odds for a long time now."
She hoped his luck would hold. Hoped all of their luck would hold. She had the feeling that it might not, though. They'd probably used up most of what they deserved in the attack on Atlanta.
Cache Valley, Utah
Sam heard the gate grinding open in the hillside and kept his eyes closed, murmuring the spell's incantation over and over until the last reverberations of the rock ceased and the silence of the valley was filled with the whispering screams from the opening.
Father McConnaughey picked up the small satchel at his feet, standing as Sam did. Glancing at him, Sam shook his head.
"You can't go in there, Father," he told the priest. "You have to stay, keep the fire going, keep the gate open."
"What if you need help?"
"If I do, I'm screwed," Sam said, forcing his voice to a cheeriness he was far from feeling. "The trials have to be done alone. The contract is between me and – and God – alone."
"Sam –"
"No ifs, no buts, padre," Sam said, channelling the bravado of his older brother. "I'll see you in a few."
He turned and stepped through the gap, disappearing completely as he entered the hillside. Father McConnaughey looked down at the small fire, at the tendrils of lavender-coloured smoke that rose from the silver bowl sitting on the hot coals to one side of it. The fire had to be kept going, he told himself, looking around for wood. He was going to have trust in God for this one.
Heaven
The flap of the coat was reassuring against his legs, Castiel realised as he strode down the long chamber toward the raised dais. Novak's coat had been long gone, but he'd remembered every detail and the new one was identical.
"Michael."
The archangel was sitting at one side of the dais, staring at the fluted column of crystal a few feet away. He turned his head slowly to look at the seraphim.
"The Grigori have raised their army. They are heading for Kansas."
Michael nodded tiredly. "Sariel told me that Kokabiel and Gadriel left with Camael. Neither have been heard from since. And Belial walks the earthly plane."
Cas stared at him, a slight frown drawing his brows together as he heard the level of disinterest in Michael's voice. "You must call the Host."
"To bring down the pillars of Heaven, Castiel? To destroy everything we've spent millennia protecting?"
"Camael will destroy it all anyway, if you don't act," Cas snapped. "Starting with allowing Belial to corrupt the Earth and rid them of humanity, and finishing by purging Heaven!"
"And what would you have me do?" Michael said, anger displacing the despair in his voice. "If I leave to fight your friends' battles down here, Camael will have his victory here! He is the Scribe, Cas, he knows the secrets of our Father!"
"Not all of them," Cas countered. "If he knew the instructions on the tablets, he would have acted already, not made the alliances with the Tainted Ones, nor with archdemons."
Michael turned away and Cas felt frustration burst in his chest. "Give me a battalion at least, so we don't lose the few left of our Father's creations!"
"I need every angel here, Castiel."
"You have given up already!"
"No," Michael said, getting to his feet. "I haven't given up yet. But I cannot help you. The humans will have to fight their own battles. I will not let the pillars fall and I will not let Camael's rebellion succeed."
The great chamber sighed with the flutter of unseen wings as the archangel vanished and Cas was left standing alone, staring at the smooth, white marble floor.
July 13, 2013. West Keep, Kansas
"What the hell are you doing?" Sandy stared at Miller as he loaded the small truck with guns and ammunition from the armoury.
"What I should have had the guts to do two days ago," Miller grunted, heaving the last box into the back and slamming the tail-gate shut. "My duty."
"What?"
Miller finished tying off the lacing to the truck's canvas cover and turned around, his expression cold and hard.
"I listened to Tomlinson and Macey, listened to that little skank before she left. Left my brain in my other pants, and believed all that crap." He walked around to the cab. "I was in Atlanta, when they came in. Sitting on a bus that was a part of a long line of buses, taking us to get our throats cut. Winchester was the one who faced down the devil and killed him. Not anyone here. Jackson's a good man and a good leader and maybe if we ever get some peace around here, he'll be the one to keep things running right. But Winchester is the real leader of this place, and he and Franklin and their boys are driving to a fight where they're outnumbered at least a hundred to one, if not more, according to Jackson. So I ain't gonna sit on my ass and wait to see how that turns out. The old world is dead. This one needs more than politics to keep it going."
He opened the door with a wrench and swung up into the cab, slamming the door behind him and leaning out the open window. "You can tell that to Macey when you see him."
The engine started with a deep rumble and a blat of exhaust and Sandy stepped back as the carpenter pulled the vehicle around in a tight circle and headed for the tunnel.
"Where the fuck do you think you're going?" he yelled out after him.
"Colorado!" The shout came back just as the truck rolled into the shadow.
Bobby stuck his head into the office and Jackson looked up. "Better come take a look at this," he said, disappearing again.
Jackson got up and walked around the desk and out of the room, following the hunter down the hall.
"Gonna give me a clue?"
"Easier if you see it for yerself."
They walked to the stairs and started to climb, both panting by the time they reached the roof. Leading him over to the lower section of the crenellated wall, Bobby gestured to the north. Jackson's brows lifted as he saw the movement of the vehicles, lines here and there, solitary cars moving out and accelerating to join the next.
"What the hell?"
"You tell me."
"Where are they going?" Jackson looked across to the roads visible from this height, from the other keeps. There were more trucks and cars leaving from those as well. "Are they bailing?"
"Nope." Bobby watched a line of troop carriers leaving Lightning Oak. "Going to Colorado."
Jackson's head snapped around to look him. "For Dean?"
"Seems like."
"How? Why?" the farmer sputtered. "I thought –"
Bobby's mouth lifted in a dry smile. "Mitch called me. Said that he'd been seeing people leaving all morning. I went and talked to one of them, fella by the name of Ross," he said. "Told me he'd thought it over. Was his family at risk. He couldn't get that thought out of his head. He was loading up from Franklin's stash and going out there. Thought the others felt the same way."
"Son of a bitch," Jackson said softly. "Will they make it in time?"
"Should be there around the same time as Boze," Bobby said. "I don't know if that's gonna help with what Dean's doing, but if they get out of the pass, it'll be somethin'."
"How many, do you think?"
"So far, over a thousand," Bobby said. "I don't know for sure."
Hell
Sam looked around the dark rock tunnel. He'd left the marker at the door and had walked down the tunnel for perhaps five minutes when he realised he was passing the same bend again.
In your bones, you had to visualise what you were looking for.
His face screwed up as he realised that plan was going to obviate any hope of surprise for the attack. And it would put him right in the demon's field. He'd have seconds, at most, to do this.
The third trial is the final purification of the contract. The gates still had to be closed after it. If he died first, what happened then? Chuck said that he hadn't found anything on the tablet to cover that eventuality but he'd admitted that there was still a lot information on the stone that he hadn't seen.
You must have faith. Father Emilio's voice breathed in his mind and he saw the Jesuit's face, watching him, the warm, dark brown eyes almost imploring. Faith.
Sam felt a shudder ripple through him. Faith in a God who'd let his sons run riot over the earth, let them manipulate humanity and then attempt to exterminate them? Faith in himself? After every erroneous decision, every self-centred choice to take the easier way and the hell with the final result?
He pulled in a deep breath, feeling the bubble and creak in his lungs which still felt half-full, and closed his eyes. The smell, acrid-sharp and burned metal. The thin, cold wind that came from nowhere, carrying that scent along with it. The impenetrable blackness of the hood, filled with something so evil light refused to enter and illuminate what hid inside. A hand, reaching for him, closing around his arm, the black bones held together with shreds of mottled tendon.
Hell obliged and the accursed plane swung itself around him, squeezing him tightly and dropping him.
He opened his eyes, staring around. He was still on the first level. But the corridor he'd come through was gone. Broken rock and oily pools surrounded him, the stench of brimstone filled his nose and mouth, and the wind moaned and whispered through the acid-pitted stone of the walls towering above him, their fanged outline dark against turgid thundery storm clouds.
The sword gripped tightly in his hand, Sam swung around as he felt the pull at his soul. Asmodeus ruled the First Level. And the archdemon stood several yards from him, black shroud shivering in the eddies caused by the rising heat and the atmospheric charge lighting the cloud cover above.
It moved faster than he could register and the draining sensation filled him abruptly, the demon's hands lifting for him. Against his mind, Sam felt rather than heard laughter, and for an endless time his thoughts and feelings were drowned in a black wave of depravity, of degradation and humiliation, a razor-bright agony shrieking through his body and a nauseating lick and satiation churning in his stomach, spreading through his organs. The taste of pain and the smell of despair, images that swamped his senses.
Vessel of the Lightbringer. Drunk with the blood of the innocent. Breaker of seals. Destroyer. Damned.
The voice that was not a voice prised its way into his mind and Sam heaved involuntarily, the splat of blood and bile landing at the demon's feet. The act of rejection seemed to sponge clean the taint of the demon's touch in his head and he lifted the sword tip, setting his teeth together tightly and stepping forward.
July 15, 2013. I-70, Colorado
Dean stopped the truck in the middle of the interstate, peering out through the windshield at the vertical rock that rose to either side of him. He got out, hearing the engines of the vehicles behind him idling, their low throb filling the narrow pass.
There were several roads across the mountains, leading down to Boulder and Golden. Franklin had sent scouts on ahead, and four of those roads had been destroyed already, earth movements or the ravages of the winter storms. It didn't matter. He was sure that the Grigori would come here, the only road that was more-or-less intact and wide enough to accommodate their army and its vehicles.
As they'd climbed slowly, the ex-soldier had left teams behind. There were multiple overpasses across the road and he'd agreed that blowing them as they moved back would be a strategically good idea. He wasn't sure that they would be moving back but it couldn't hurt to be ready.
Three hundred men against ten thousand. He thought they had a bit under three hundred, and an uneasy feeling they were going to be facing more than ten thousand, but the principles were the same. Bottlenecked in the narrow pass, the army would be a sitting target for the weapons they could put up on the high sides of the cut, and out-flanking them would be a tricky proposition for the enemy, limiting them to what they could carry while they climbed.
Of course, if they'd brought along the cambion – he cut off that thought. One set of impossibilities was enough to deal with at a time.
Franklin walked up to him. "This is the best we can hope for."
Dean nodded. "Let's get set up."
He could feel the vibration, through the bones of his elbows, resting against the rock, through the pads of his fingers, through his teeth, almost. Feet moving in unison, sympathetic vibrations transmitted from the concrete road to the bones of the mountain beneath. Not far now, a couple of miles at most.
In front of him, the Stig sat like an ugly toad, black and boxy and squat, the big-bore muzzle pointed down to where he could see the end of the road as it curved behind the walls of the defile. The box magazines were stacked beside him, and he ran an eye over it again. Against his ear, the comms piece was silent.
They were ready, as ready as they would ever be, he thought sourly. Twenty guns were on the top of the cut, covering a mile. The Semtex was embedded and Franklin held the detonators, two miles back down the interstate. There were no lines of soldiers down there, the field had to be kept clear for the snipers but they'd all be in it once the ammunition they'd lugged up with them was gone.
His thoughts skittered around the edges of where Sam was, what he was doing. He didn't want to distract himself with speculation. From his vantage point, looking to the east, he could see the line of black cloud that stretched from one side of the side of the horizon to the other. Death's words brushed against the back of his mind and he forced those thoughts aside as well. If the archdemon brought up all his foul creations there was a box of toys that Chuck had translated from the tablet to deal with them. He hoped.
He turned his head back to the gun at the sound of distant shouting, edging closer to the stock, shifting his weight to look into the scope. The breeze that had fallen in the early morning was fluttering now, indecisive but strengthening. He swallowed as it brushed by his face and he caught the smell of rot.
They came around the bend, magnified in his scope, living and dead, he realised. In the front, a man and a boy walked fast, and Dean's finger slid from the guard down to the trigger, the muscle at the point of his jaw leaping as he recognised the boy. The hairlines centred over the boy's chest and he squeezed the trigger.
The capricious breeze chose that moment to change direction and strengthen and he swore to himself as the man beside the boy dropped to the ground, a large red hole flowering in the centre of his chest. Through the scope, Dean watched the boy look down then wildly around, disappearing before he could get the next round in and line him up again.
From the cliff-tops, the steady clack-clack of the big guns sounded, muted with distance but the bodies of the first lines of the army disintegrating as the point five-oh calibre rounds punched through them, taking down not just the leading edge but those behind as well with overpenetration. A low whistle between the rock walls and Dean watched the missile hit the road, exploding on impact, the shrapnel, marked and bound and blessed inside the casing, bursting out and zipping through dozens of bodies, dropping them and keeping the demons locked inside the tattered shreds of flesh that were left.
The army hesitated, front lines milling and vacillating on the spot then the orders must have come from behind and they surged forward, moving from a shambling march into a run, the defile filled with the guttural roar from their throats.
"Now," Dean said in a low voice.
Miles away, Franklin hit the button for the explosive packed into the walls of the cut and they went off, a staccato series of blasts along the line of stratification, bringing down the walls on top of the running corpses that filled the road from side to side.
Dean grabbed the gun, swinging the stabilisers up with a sharp click against the barrel and slung the bag of ammunition over his shoulder, turning and making his way east fast over the broken terrain. The bombs would buy a little more time, time to get to the next hit point and see how they were doing. From the other side, he could hear the Stingers, launched at the army that was still advancing down through the demolished cut. He faltered as he heard screams from the other cliff side, stomach sinking, a helpless rage shaking through him. Whatever'd happened, it was too late to help. He hunched his shoulders and continued down over the bare rock. More than just the two cambion. Or the boy had been given his orders.
By the time he reached the road, it was filled with great, gaping craters, and piled high with body parts, a thin wash of reddish black liquid seeping out from beneath the piles of the twice-dead corpses and trickling down over the seamed concrete. He dropped the Stig and the bag, pulling out the M60 and checking the mag, flipping to semi as he unhurriedly picked out his targets from the mass coming toward him.
Spread across the road, he caught a glimpse of Rufus to one side, beyond him Nate and Elias, Kelly, Winifred and Herb, Jack and the bright red hair of Willis, intermingled with the garrison of troops he didn't know, the trainees he hadn't met, shoulder to shoulder as they held their weapons and fired steadily, continuously, into the solid wall of animated dead coming for them.
With every hit, the demon-filled corpses dropped, the binding sigils on the bullets holding them to the dead flesh and the expansion of the bullet keeping that sigil locked into the body. Dean watched emotionlessly as the mound grew in front of them, distanced from the smells and sounds and spectacle, his world narrowed down to the sight at the end of the barrel and the targets that lay beyond it.
"Front line, retreat!"
Franklin's voice crackled in his ear and he ignored it, the muscles of arm and shoulder and finger aching as the barrel swung smoothly from one side of the road to the other.
"Repeat. Emplacement is up, they have you in range. Retreat!"
The words gradually registered and he looked around, seeing the flickered glances from the hunters and soldiers beside him. He realised, belatedly and with a sense of shock, that they were waiting for his order. He nodded abruptly to Rufus, lifting his arm in a full swing. He was turning when the distinctive whistle filled the narrow space between the remains of the cut, growing louder, and his peripheral vision caught sight of the mortar as it arced down toward them.