Chapter 39 It's Never Over
Warsaw, Missouri
Dean woke abruptly, his head sliding off his hand, the chair under him rocking slightly. He looked at his watch and let out his breath. Not late, still early in the morning.
Glancing at the steel door of the store room, he listened for a moment. There wasn't a sound from in there, and he got up, going to the sink in the head and turning on the tap, splashing handfuls of the cold water over his face until he felt slightly more alert. He'd bought a bag of groceries along with the fast food last night, he felt like egg and sausage, hoping that Kevin would too. The kid had to eat more. Eat better. He frowned slightly. Whatever.
Retrieving the frying pan from the drainer, he broke in a half dozen eggs, stirring them up and adding a little milk as they started to cook. The sausage went in, cooking fast and he kept the two separated, banging on the bottom and sides of the pan periodically, glancing at the door which remained closed.
"Hey, Kevin! Come and grab some of these eggs."
There was no response and he looked at the cooking food in frustration. "Kev, c'mon, man, you can't hide in there forever."
The squeal and bang of the door wasn't behind him and he turned, looking up the narrow corridor to the cabin door at the end as Kevin locked it and walked toward him.
"Where the hell you been?" he asked him. "What happened to being scared?"
Kevin stopped at the doorway. "I am scared." He looked at the table. "So I made a pre-emptive move."
Dean turned as Kevin walked past him, pulling off his coat. "You made a what?"
"I can't sit here like a … a sitting duck," Kevin said shortly. "And Crowley breathing down my ass … getting rid of the tablet just takes off some of the pressure."
Dean bit back the first response he wanted to make. "By getting rid of it?"
"Temporarily," Kevin clarified. "I hid it."
"What?!" Dean turned as Kevin headed for the store room. "Where?!"
"If I tell you where, it's not hidden, is it?" Kevin said, his tone disparaging.
"Kevin," Dean said, his voice dropping to a level that could have been a warning – or a threat. "Tell me where the damned tablet is, or I swear to you –"
Kevin spun around, looking at him irritably. "You'll … what, Dean?" he spat out. "What will you do, exactly?"
"Did it occur to you that if you know where the tablet is, and Crowley does somehow get a hold of you, we've lost you both – again?" Dean asked.
Kevin shook his head. "You keep telling me how safe it is here!"
"It is!" Dean snapped. Kevin opened the door to the store room. "Kevin!"
The young man stepped through and shook his head at him, flicking on the light as he pulled the door closed. Dean heard the locks turn inside it.
Sonofabitch.
This is exactly how we ended up last time, he thought angrily, pushing the pan off the burner as he caught the scent of burning and turning off the stove. But exactly.
The rushing sound of wings filled the cabin and he swung around. On the other side of the table a woman stood, immaculately dressed in a grey silk suit, dark red hair drawn up and back from her face. The expression of understanding on the blandly unlined face didn't reach her storm-wrack blue eyes.
Hell.
Reflection or illusion, Sam wondered as he looked past the stone, seeing the room Bobby was in clearly from the corner of his eye, unable to get to it. He reached out sideways and felt the cool solidity of the rock against his fingers. Turning to the other side of the corridor, he reached out again.
This time his fingers passed through the stone wall he could see with his eyes, and he saw it obliquely enter the room that was reflected on the opposite side. He turned and walked through the wall, the knife in his hand, not giving himself time to wonder if this was a smart thing to do or not.
Passing through the illusion brought a tingle to his nerve ends but that seemed to be all. And now he wasn't looking at the scene through the remove of a reflection. The demon spun around, the thick-set, black-skinned body surprisingly fast, jet-black eyes widening slightly as it saw him.
Closing the distance between them, Sam slashed sideways and down with the knife, and the demon howled as red-gold light boiled in the long wound. It began to dissolve into the more familiar charcoal smoke and Sam drove the blade forward, his weight slamming into the half-solid, half-amorphous creature, pinning it to the wall with the knife buried deep inside of it, its scream dying away in the small room.
He turned to see Bobby lying on a stone table, the angle set at forty-five degrees from horizontal, hands and feet bound tightly to the corners. When he'd seen him in the reflection, most of his insides had been removed, draped over his arms and legs. Now, he was whole again, thinner, his face hollowed out and shadowed with pain, but not ripped to shreds.
"Bobby?"
The old man's eyes opened slowly, disbelievingly, closing again in disappointment as they passed over him without seeing him, Sam thought.
"Bobby, I'm here," he tried again. Bobby didn't move, didn't answer.
Sam moved to the table and slid the pins from the shackles at his feet, letting the chains drop to the floor and going to the top of the slab to do the same to his hands. The noise, the sight of his bonds falling away, brought Bobby back and Sam watched him sit up cautiously, eyes narrowed as he searched the room again.
"Who's there?" His voice was cracked and hoarse, and the end of the last word disappeared in a fit of coughing.
"It's Sam, Bobby," Sam said loudly, walking to him. He put his hand on the soul's shoulder and saw Bobby flinch away from it, rolling off the other side of the table and dropping into a stiff-kneed crouch.
That wasn't working, Sam thought tiredly. Nothing was ever easy. The idea that came was a little left field, but he was running out of options, and he had to be able to communicate with Bobby's soul, had to be able to get through to him, somehow, or he'd never be able to get him out of here.
He set the knife against the top of his forearm and made a long, shallow cut, dipping his finger in the blood that welled up in it and moving beside the table.
"Sam," he muttered, writing out the word on the stone.
Bobby's eyes widened as he saw the letters forming on the stone surface. "Sam?"
"Here," Sam continued, dipping his finger into the cut again. "Rescue. You."
"Bullshit," Bobby whispered, watching the blood appear on the stone, the letters forming the words. "Bullshit, this is another delusion. Another hallucination."
"No. Bullshit." Sam laboriously wrote out, adding under his breath, "C'mon, Bobby, get it, I'm running out of blood here."
"Sam?" Bobby took a step around the table. "That really you?"
"Yes," Sam wrote with relief.
"I can't see you," Bobby said, stating the obvious. "Can you … there's a legend … I don't know if it's true or not … hell, I don't know if I could do it or not …"
"?" Sam wrote quickly.
"If you're real, here in your body, I might be able to see you if I can – see a soul is supposed to be able to see everything, if it tastes mortal blood … I mean, it's a long shot, probably not a snowball's of it being right, you know how those legends are –"
He stopped talking as Sam walked around the table and smeared a fingertip over his mouth, the blood bright against Bobby's pale lips. Sam held his breath as Bobby licked it off. The light, the beating, pulsing light, froze in the room for a micro-second and Bobby blinked rapidly.
"Jesus, Sam, it's you," the old man breathed, staring straight at him. "What the hell are you doing here? Please don't tell me that you –"
"No, Bobby. No. I'm good." Sam grinned shakily, relief sucking the strength from him for a drawn-out second. "Long story, we gotta get out of here, Bobby. You're not supposed to be here."
"Tell me about it," Bobby shook his head and stepped forward, throwing his arms around the younger man. Sam returned the hug, his nervous system buzzing slightly with a rising combination of relief and anxiety. Time was ticking away. They had to get back to Purgatory.
"Alright, grab my hand," he said, turning back to the doorway of the cell. "I left my watch near our exit and –"
He closed his eyes, focussing hard on the image and felt the corridors and cell and floor shift around him. Beside him, he heard Bobby's sharply indrawn breath.
The watch was there, half-hidden in the shadow of the curved stone, just as he'd left it. He let out his breath and grabbed it, looking down at the time. The hands had stopped and he felt his chest constrict suddenly.
"Watch has stopped," he muttered tersely. Bobby nodded.
"Mine too. Time's different here."
"You think it'll catch up when we get out?"
"Yeah, better hope so anyway, if you're on some kind of schedule," Bobby shrugged.
"Hey!"
They both turned at the shout from the end of the corridor.
"Fight or run?" Bobby snapped at Sam. Sam looked at the demons running toward them.
"Run," he said, sliding in behind the wall and pushing Bobby ahead of him. "To the draught."
This time the vertiginous wrench wasn't such a shock. He stumbled over the height difference, slamming into Bobby as the older hunter staggered forward into Purgatory's flat pewter light. Behind them, the hole remained dark and empty.
Amherst, Massachusetts
Crowley slammed the book down on the desk, staring at the high, delicately plastered ceiling above him. He turned and looked at the tall, austere woman in front of his desk.
"Am I the only one who sees the urgency of this situation?" he asked, voice rising as his irritation grew.
"Sir, every demon on this plane is –"
"Something is going on," Crowley interrupted coldly. "My hellhound has been killed. Winchester, jumbo-sized, is trying to break into the mothership … and that prophet of theirs is madly translating away … add it up!"
"We can't locate the Winchesters, sir, their protection is too –"
"Did I ask what you couldn't do?" Crowley snapped. "Tell me what you can do!"
The woman drew in a deep breath. "I have demons tracking through every phone record incoming and outgoing to every number in the country, looking for a link to the Trans, sir," she said quietly. "We're also running traces on any unusual activity to find hunters –"
She stopped at the knock on the door, dropping her gaze and turning slightly to face it.
"Mr Crowley is extremely busy, Rhonda –"
"What?" Crowley ignored her, walking to the door.
"We've located the missing demon, sir," Rhonda said, looking down at the floor. "He's in Missouri. He told the demons who found him that he was being held by the Winchesters, sir."
Crowley looked at her speculatively. "Did he?"
Without turning to look behind him, he snapped his fingers. "You're fired."
The tall woman turned from flesh to ash as Crowley lowered his hand. "Rhonda, is it?"
"Yes, sir," Rhonda confirmed, swallowing at the small pile of ash on the floor.
"Let's see how you handle responsibility," Crowley said, turning away. "There's an opening for a personal assistant now."
"Yes, sir."
"Bring me that demon," he told her. "Make sure he arrives here in perfect condition."
"Yes, sir."
"Something's going on, Rhonda," Crowley said consideringly, staring out the long, multi-paned windows to the gardens beyond. "Something to do with my tablet." He turned to look at her. "I need Kevin Tran, Rhonda. And I need his half of the tablet. Apparently, his half has the good stuff, whereas mine has the acknowledgements and 'About the Author'!"
"Yes, sir."
He frowned at her in annoyance. "Not too obsequious, Rhonda. Just get on with it."
She bit back the automatic response, and dropped her gaze, backing out of the doorway and closing the door behind her.
"Left one of your informants behind, did you, Dean?" Crowley turned back to the window. "That wasn't very bright, was it?"
Warsaw, Missouri
"Kids," the red-haired woman said. "So cute when they're little, but then they turn into teenagers and the party's over."
Smiling ruefully at him, she took a step toward him, holding her hand out. "We haven't been formally introduced, Dean. My name is Naomi."
Dean backed away from her, the back of his neck prickling. "Oh, I know who you are." He looked dismissively down at the extended hand. "And I know what you did to Cas after he got out of Purgatory."
"After I rescued him from Purgatory, you mean," she corrected him, a touch acerbically. "At the cost of many angels' lives."
"You screwed with his head," Dean said, staring at her. "And had him spy on us."
The last few words came out a lot more angrily than he thought they would. Those memories weren't going to let him go, he thought, his expression smoothing out as he tried to get them back down behind the wall in his head.
"Well, it is true, I have spoken to Castiel many times," she said, her gaze cutting away to the right. "Trying to reach out to him, trying to help him," she added, looking back at him. "Dean, you must have noticed how Purgatory changed him? I mean, he's been unstable in the past, but I was shocked by how damaged he is now."
"Stop, okay?" Dean said, his stomach churning. "Don't – don't try to spin this. You think I don't know that you told him to try and kill me?"
She looked at him, eyes widening slightly. "No one ever – oh … I suppose that might have been how he would've heard it," she said, her gaze and shoulders dropping as she seemed to realise something. "When I learned of the angel tablet, I did tell Castiel to get it – at any cost. That's my job," she said frankly. "To protect Heaven."
He looked at her, looking for the cracks in her expression, in her story. Cas hadn't been himself, hell, for years now. But he was still prepared to back his word over this woman, this … angel … who was too slick, too practised at lying.
"I'm a warrior, Dean. Just as you are," she continued. "What would you expect? And now, Castiel is out there, on his own, not knowing what he's doing or why, with an object that could bring down not only Heaven but every plane of Creation ..." She looked away, swallowing. "I'm scared. For all of us."
Dean smiled derisively. "Nice speech, but save it. See, I don't trust angels. Which means I don't trust you."
"And yet, you haven't warded this place against us," Naomi said lightly, looking around. She watched Dean's face harden. "I know. You are hoping that Castiel will return to you. I admire your loyalty. I only wish he felt the same way. I know you don't want to believe it, Dean, but you and I are on the same side."
He made a small, noncommittal noise in the back of his throat and she smiled.
"Shutting the gates of Hell. Bringing Castiel in from the cold," she said to him. "Take a moment. Think about what I've told you."
She started to turn and stopped. "Oh, I know you've been doing business with a crow – Arjay, I believe? He did mention, didn't he, that the gate he uses to get into Hell is through Purgatory?"
Dean stared at her, that information crashing into him like a freight train.
"Sometimes he doesn't mention that," she added lightly. "I thought you'd better know. You see, we can be of help to one another."
The sound of beating wings filled the small cabin and she was gone, leaving Dean to stare at the wall sightlessly.
Through Purgatory, he thought. Sam and Bobby would be in Purgatory.
Sedalia, Missouri
Dean swerved into the empty parking space opposite the alley mouth and killed the engine, grabbing the keys and getting out in a single motion. The yellow taxi was still parked there, and he walked fast across the street, stopping by the driver's side door as he saw the shape of the crow in the front seat.
"Arjay?" He rapped on the window with the side of his fist. "Hey!"
Inside the taxi, there was no movement, no response. The psychopomp leaned back against the seat, mouth open and Dean looked closer, his hand closing around the door handle and pulling the door open. From the interior of the car, the mixed scents of anchovy pizza and the first faint outriders of decomposition wafted out over him.
Dead. For hours. He shut the door, absently wiping his prints from the handle and leaned against the side of the car, rubbing the heel of his hand over one brow.
What now? There had to be a way, he thought, fighting down the panic that wanted to explode. There was always a way. He stared at the alley walls and that way came to him, along with a rising feeling of shame and guilt and despair.
There was only one person he knew who could get into Purgatory … and out again. He felt his heart sink as he realised what he had to do, what he had to ask.
He'd told Sam that he'd lost the vampire's number. It hadn't been the whole truth. But he'd let him go. Cut him loose when he'd been hurting and left him to sink or swim on his own. He sucked in a breath. Didn't matter, he was the only one who could do it. And he was the only one he could ask for help. There just wasn't anyone else.
Pulling his phone out of his pocket, he punched in the number, wondering if Benny had even kept that cell phone. It was ringing, and a moment later, the familiar long-drawn out and soft Louisiana drawl filled his ear, the surprise muted by a warmth and a happiness that was evident even across the airwaves.
"Hey, yeah, it's me," Dean said, feeling his throat closing up.
"Dean, I'm real pleased to hear your voice, man, but you said we were done and that was a while ago?"
Benny sounded uncertain, Dean thought. Not a surprise.
"I know. I know, man, it's been a while," Dean said, walking up the alley as he talked. "I mean, I wanted to call, I did. I just … I just thought it might be better if I didn't." He felt his face screwing up at that lie. He'd wanted to call. He couldn't. Not and keep Sam happy. And he never would've called the vampire again if it hadn't been necessary. Now he was lying to the one friend who'd never let him down. He looked down at the ground, wondering if the vampire knew.
"S'okay, man, it's just real good to hear your voice," Benny said, hearing the discomfort, the little pauses. The hunter had been proud of his ability to lie, but he sucked at it, really. When it came to the people he cared about, he was hopeless.
"How you been?" Dean asked.
"Oh, you know, I get by," Benny allowed, pulling the tube from a blood bag and sticking it in the corner of his mouth. He was nearly out again. Have to do something about that. He couldn't tell Dean how it had been. Once, he could've. Not now.
Dean heard the edge in his voice, could see, in his mind's eye, the expression that would be on the vampire's face, his gaze cutting to one side as he veered away from the truth. "I guess I let you down, huh?"
"I'm just happy as hell to hear from you," Benny said, his own relief outweighing the guilt he could hear, riddling the hunter's voice.
"You might change your mind about that," Dean told him.
"Why? What you mean?" Benny asked. It took him a couple of seconds to recognise the underlying edge to Dean's voice. Nervousness. That was different. He'd never heard that before. Not down in monsterland. Not up here. He'd heard grief, anger, suspicion, affection … but he'd never even suspected Dean was capable of getting anxious about anything.
"Benny, I gotta ask you a favour," Dean said, swallowing uncomfortably. "It's a big one."
Purgatory
"Where the hell is this?" Bobby looked around at the forest, the even, grey light.
"Don't get all pissed off," Sam said, looking at his watch. "We're in Purgatory."
"Balls," Bobby said.
Shrugging, Sam moved past him. "Let's go."
He started to climb the slope, cutting across it at the same time, relying on his sense of direction to take him back to the place Arjay would meet them. He could hear Bobby climbing behind him, the soft panting and the occasional grunt of effort. He hoped Bobby's reflexes were good. The damned in here moved fast, faster than he'd been able to believe, at first.
"Alright," he turned and extended his hand to the older man, pulling him up the last steep section and onto the relative flatness of the trail. "Not that much further."
Bobby shook his head dismissively. He'd keep up or Sam could leave him behind. He'd realised that he'd carried all the memories of his body down into the pit with him, but he hadn't been able to jettison them, not even when the pain had become more than he could bear. He couldn't do anything about his lack of wind and aching muscles now either.
"So how many more of these trials after this?" he asked the man striding beside him.
"Just one," Sam said distractedly, looking around the forest and checking his watch. "We don't know what it is yet, Kevin's still translating."
"Jus' feels so good to be back in action again," Bobby said, raising a brow at Sam. "Might be handy to have me around to help?"
Sam stopped, turning to Bobby, his expression torn. "Bobby, I'd love that, believe me." He pulled in a breath. "We burned your bones, Bobby. There's nothing left to tie you to earth."
Bobby looked away. He would'a done the same, he knew. He'd wanted to give Dean a pyre, and it was just as well that his brother hadn't let him.
"Okay, yeah."
"The other thing is," Sam said slowly. "For this trial to be completed … your soul has to enter Heaven."
Bobby nodded. Two very good reasons. He couldn't argue with them. Wasn't going to. "Yeah … yeah, well. You know, I always figured that'd be the end of it, going up on a pyre, hunter's funeral. Zip. Nothing." He shrugged. "And I was okay with that."
He looked back at Sam, his expression derisory. "Imagine my surprise …"
Sam's mouth twisted into a rueful smile. "Although, if there has to be an eternity, I'd pick Heaven over Hell."
"Yeah, 'cause there's nothing screwy goin' on up there," Bobby said, rolling his eyes.
"I wish I made the rules," Sam said, turning around to look around them again. He could feel eyes on him, watching them, considering them.
"Yeah, well, I'll do my part," Bobby said, sighing. "Get to the end of this, but … I ain't exactly the retiring type, so you two figure out a way to spring me …"
Sam turned curiously to him. "Yeah, but … don't you want to see Karen again, maybe Rufus? Or Ellen?"
Bobby stopped and looked at him. "Thought I couldn't do that?"
Sam shrugged. "That was then. Cas said a lot of things had changed."
Bobby thought about that. If that was what waiting for him, it changed a lot. A real lot. He'd lost as many as the brothers who he'd considered his family. He would be okay with spending eternity with those he'd loved. His attention came reluctantly back to Sam, belatedly registering that the younger man was turning around and around like a dog about to settle for a sleep, staring at the forest around them.
"Well, let's get topside."
Sam didn't answer, peering at the trees.
"What's going on, Sam?"
"This is it," Sam said, turning back to him. "I'm sure of it."
"Where your cabbie s'posed to meet you?" Bobby asked, looking around the clearing.
"Yeah," Sam said, his voice filling with tension as he lifted his hand again to look at his watch. "At exactly … now."
"So … he's runnin' a little late," Bobby suggested.
"No. See that's the thing, he was very specific, Bobby," Sam said vehemently. "Like, to the minute."
Bobby felt his stomach drop. "And if he doesn't show?"
"We got no way out," Sam said, looking at him uneasily.
"How the hell did Dean get out?" Bobby stared at him, his mind flipping through everything he'd read, heard or imagined about Purgatory.
"He had help," Sam said. "A vampire showed him a gate."
Bobby snorted. "Out of the goodness of its bloodsucking heart?"
Sam shook his head. "For a ride back to the real world."
Bobby's amusement vanished. "And Dean agreed to that? Didn't welch on the deal when it came due?"
"It wasn't … he wasn't your usual type of vampire, Bobby," Sam said slowly. "Dean wouldn't talk much about it, but Benny earned his trust."
Bobby opened his mouth and closed it again. That was something. That really was something. He heard something in Sam's voice and looked at him.
"You didn't trust him?"
Sam shook his head. "No."
Bobby looked at him. Something had happened between them, something bigger and deeper than he'd seen before. Something had been broken.
Sedalia, Missouri
Dean moved the Impala off the street and into the alley and turned off the engine. It would take Benny about five hours to get here, and he couldn't leave, couldn't do anything but sit and wait for him, his stomach dipping and twisting at what he was going to ask for, at the thoughts of the vampire's reaction.
He never should've cut him loose, he thought, tipping his head back against the seat and closing his eyes. Never should have let his need for Sam's approval go that far. Fuck, he'd lost everything and it'd helped with Sam, a little, he guessed, but not enough to cover the cost.
It hadn't been the first betrayal, and he thought that it hadn't even been the worst, but it had broken something, something that he'd been holding onto, something that he'd needed, for himself. And even if this all worked out the way he wanted it to, the way he hoped it would, he didn't think he'd be able to get that back.
I guess I'm not the man either of our dads wanted me to be.
He wasn't the man he'd wanted to be. The things he'd believed in, the things he'd held onto, they'd all been smashed and broken, trodden underfoot, some of them by others, some by himself. The most important ones had been fractured by what he'd done.
His brother had talked of a light at the end of the tunnel, a way to live with who they'd become, with what they did … he couldn't see a way to do that. He couldn't see a way to even getting close to it. What he'd done, it had made him who he was now. And who he was now … he couldn't let anyone else see it. There were too many edges that cut now. Too many things he could no longer look at it or think about. Too many wounds inside that were festering, and poisoning him and, little by little, he thought bleakly, killing him.
Benny had been a good friend. His best friend. Had never let him down. Had risked his life to save him and had never given him any reason to doubt him. And he'd known, known what the vampire had needed. Known that Benny had needed him to stay good, to stay human.
If he agreed to this, Dean thought, to hell with it all. He wasn't going to cut him loose again. Sam would have to live with it. He'd protect him from any hunter and if that meant he was targeted as well, so be it.
The rattle and bang of the rust-bucket pickup woke him, pulling into the mouth of the alley just as dawn cleared the city buildings. He'd caught about three hours, he thought, climbing out of the car, shivering a little in the cold air. It would be enough.
"Thanks," Dean said as Benny got out of the pickup. "I mean it."
Benny smiled, a slow, three-cornered smile that crinkled up his eyes. "You don' look so good, cher."
Dean dragged in a deep breath. "It's a – it's complicated," he said, shaking his head. "Short version, my brother's in Purgatory and the guide that took him there is dead. I need your help."
Benny looked at him carefully, eyes narrowing a little. "Only one way I can get into Purgatory, Dean."
"I know," he said apologetically, his voice low and deep. "If you want nothing to do with this, I completely understand."
Benny whistled softly. "Wow, Dean Winchester asks for a favour, he not screwing around," he said, laughing uncomfortably.
"Benny, sending you back there was the last thing I ever wanted to do," Dean said.
"I know, cher, I know," Benny said, looking down at the ground. He could hear the reluctance in the man, could see it in his face. He was strung up between two choices that must have been tearing him apart for the last five hours, and Benny could see he wasn't lying about the backdoor clause. It might well kill him, but he was asking for help, he wasn't going to try and take it by force.
Not that it would've helped much to try that, Benny considered. It was still somethin' to see Dean in a place where he was a hair's breadth from begging. He didn't like it. He didn't like it all.
"My little brother is stuck down there," Dean continued, unable to get that out of his head. Sam – and Bobby – stuck in a world where kill or be killed was the only rule.
Benny looked up at him, mouth lifting up on one side. "This be the little brother that wants to kill me, right?"
Dean didn't smile. "You got access to the place –"
"By access, you mean getting beheaded?" Benny clarified the concept for both of them. "Dying."
Dean looked away. "Yeah, you're right, it's –"
"Oh, c'mon, Dean," Benny said, his throat tightening as he watched the expressions chase over the man's face. He felt things too deep. They both did. It was, Benny thought, what they had in common. And he couldn't look at it now. "You know I love a challenge."
Dean looked at him, eyes widening fractionally, uncertainly. "You serious?"
The smile fell away. "Hey. He's your brother," Benny said, as if that was the only self-evident answer. "I say, let's do this."
"I owe you," Dean said, the words a promise … a vow.
Benny shook his head dismissively. "No, you don't owe me nothin'."
He looked away, hiding the sneaking feeling of relief that was trickling through him. "Truth is, Dean … I could use a break from all this … all this everything."
Seeing the vampire's expression, Dean felt his chest constrict on him. "Has it really been that tough?"
Benny flicked him a glance. In another place, another time, he might've told him everything. Neither one of them could lie for shit to the other.
"I'm not a good fit, Dean," he said simply. "Not with the vampires, for sure not with the humans. I don't belong."
He thought of Andrea and of Elizabeth. All his hopes. All his dreams.
"After a while, that starts to wear on you," he said, brows drawing together as he tried to find a way to explain. And the last few months, he'd come so close. So close to being a monster and giving up. He needed people, not many, just one or two. To trust. To care about. To put his back against.
Watching him struggle with the words, with the emotions that were driving that struggle, Dean felt as if Benny was talking about him. No light at the end of the tunnel for either of them, he thought. No place to fit. No place to be himself and rest.
The vampire looked at his friend, seeing the understanding in his face, deep in his eyes. He turned away and forced a laugh, shaking his head. "Hell, cry me a river, like you need to hear all my crap."
"When you get back up here," Dean said abruptly. "We're gonna fix all that, okay?"
Benny looked at the ground. "When I get back?"
Dean felt a stab of guilt as he realised the vampire hadn't expected to come back. "You find the place, Benny and you ride out of Purgatory with Sam, just like you did with me. Okay?"
Benny closed his eyes, nodding a little.
"As soon as I send you back, I'm gonna haul my ass up to Maine and I'm going to be waiting there for you as soon you hit topside," Dean said, making it a promise. At the speed limit, it was a twenty-five hour drive. He wasn't going to be doing the speed limit.
Benny nodded again. "Yeah, that – that sounds like a plan, cher," he agreed. "Let's get on with it."
"You sure about this?" Dean looked at him. There was a lot there, behind the vampire's eyes. But he didn't know what it was, couldn't see the shape of it.
"Not my first rodeo, man," Benny told him quietly.
Dean turned to the car, pulling out the machete and slipping it free of the sheath. It was short, thick blade, serrated along the back, honed to a razor fine edge along the curve. Not weighted enough to use for decapitation … unless you had a lot of muscle and a good aim.
Holding out his hand, Dean looked at Benny. He could do this. He could do it knowing he could bring him back. He hoped the vamp was seeing that too.
Benny looked down at his hand and took it, closing his fingers tightly around Dean's. Dean pulled him close.
"Thank you," he said, knowing it wasn't enough, not nearly enough. He didn't have anything else. Not right now. He felt Benny's sharp nod, against his neck and shoulder.
Letting go, they stepped back and Benny huffed out a breath, lifting his head, giving Dean a good, clean target. Dean raised the machete and dropped his gaze from Benny's eyes to his throat. All of his weight behind the single stroke. No fuckups.
The blade sang as it split the air, and bit through the vampire's neck. Dean felt his gorge rise and swallowed hard as he watched Benny's head bounce on the asphalt. You'll get him back, he told himself angrily, wiping the blade clean and replacing it in the sheath, tossing it back into the car.
You'll get him back and this time you'll do it all right. If Sam was going to be risking his neck on the trials, he could use back up and Benny was the best he'd ever hope for. You'll do it right, and he'll be fine when he can see himself through your eyes, see his humanity through you.
He opened the trunk and grabbed the drop sheet, spreading it over the vampire's body and rolling him up in it, picking up the head and Benny's cap, and wrapping both in a separate plastic sheet. Picking up the body, he eased into the shallow space above the weapons in the trunk, setting the head in separately and wedging it behind the vampire's body.
The trunk lid made a thick clunk as he shut it, too similar to the noise the machete had made when it had hit Benny's neck. He felt the flinch inside and thrust it aside, going to the driver's door and getting into the car. He didn't know how long it would take for Benny to lead Sam and Bobby to the gateway out. But he needed to get going, put his attention on the car and the road and the long drive north. He wasn't planning on stopping.
Amherst, Massachusetts
Crowley looked at the demon sitting in the chair thoughtfully.
"So they summoned you, trapped you and tortured you … and you told them how to contact a crow? Does that about cover it?"
The demon nodded reluctantly. "They wanted to get into Hell."
"Yes, so you said," Crowley murmured, walking slowly around his desk. "Did they say why?"
"They asked how to find a soul in Hell."
"A soul? Any particular soul?"
"An innocent soul," the demon said, flicking a brief glance at Crowley.
"And what did you tell them?"
"I told them there were no innocent souls in Hell, sir."
Crowley's eyes narrowed slightly. There were … a few … he thought. But on the top of the Winchesters wish list would be Robert Singer. If they knew about him.
"Did they ask about a soul?"
"No, sir," the demon said, shaking his head. "It was, general, like."
Arjay had taken Singer down from Heaven, Crowley thought, an edge of bitterness lining the thought. He would've told them. But they'd been looking for an innocent soul before that, before they knew about him. Why?
"Arjay's backdoor was via Purgatory, wasn't it?"
"Yes, sir." The demon looked at him. "It's a difficult gate, sir."
"Yes," Crowley agreed. He'd only found out about it last year, while he'd been hunting around the back corridors looking for something else. It was a difficult gate. It would only accept humans. Demons and angels and monsters could not pass Go, the damned thing didn't even appear for them. So how … presuming Moose got in and found Singer … would he get them out again?
The knock on the door was soft, yet brisk and he looked past the demon, lifting a brow as Rhonda peered in.
"The Missouri contact has more information, sir," she said flatly.
"Does he now?" Crowley looked at the demon in the chair in front of the desk. "What is it?"
"Dean Winchester just killed a vampire. A vampire that he appeared to be friendly with. He's on his way to Maine. The contact said he was going to the Hundred Mile Wilderness, to be precise."
Dean had gotten out of Purgatory somehow, Crowley mused. A vampire who'd served with him in the foxholes of the land of the monsters, had known of the gate, somehow? It seemed like a possibility. A better possibility than another intervention by God. Castiel had remained behind. It'd taken an angel assault to pull him out. So it seemed unlikely that Dean had had help from that department. And now, he'd sent him back. Vampires didn't need any special passes, he'd go straight there. To guide Sam out.
"Are we tracking the car?" he asked her. She nodded.
"The coin was secreted in the car while the human was sleeping."
"Thank you, Rhonda," he said, gesturing to the door which closed.
"And thank you, Dean. I believe we can do a deal with the Winchesters after all," he said. He got up from behind the desk and looked at the demon. "You, on the other hand, have slipped up rather badly. Our policy is simple. We don't tell anyone our secrets."
The demon exhaled resignedly. Crowley's eyes narrowed and it disappeared. A thousand years in the abyss with the daeva would realign its loyalties.
Purgatory
"What happened, Sam?" Bobby asked quietly. They stood, back to back, a few feet from each other, watching the forest.
'I don't know," Sam said slowly. "Not really. Not yet."
"Dean was in here for a year? With a vamp – looking for Cas?" Bobby's voice was tense. "And you couldn't get him out?"
"Yeah," Sam answered. No one would deal with him. No one even saw him after a while. And there'd been a part of him that had been relieved when he'd realised that he would have to mourn his brother because he was gone.
"I gave up," he said, glancing over his shoulder at the other man. "And I ran."
Bobby nodded. That wasn't a surprise. Sam had been doing that for a long time. And, he guessed, it wasn't such a surprise that Dean would look for someone to back him up, someone he could trust. It was a surprise that he'd found a monster capable of doing that.
"And when he got out?"
Sam let out a gusty exhale, his gaze scanning the hundred and eighty degrees of his side of the clearing ceaselessly. He didn't know how to explain that either, he thought. Not dealing. Not acknowledging. Not admitting. All the things he hadn't done.
"He was different. He doesn't talk about what happened here," Sam told him. "I was different too."
Bobby listened as Sam told him about what he'd done, what he'd thought, what he'd thought he'd felt. Normal life. Sam's dream. It'd been just a dream, really. Like the year Dean had spent in Cicero. No one could just go from hunting to normal. No relationship could sustain the lies and omissions that were needed, both for the other person and for oneself.
"And Dean cut himself loose from the vamp, when you didn't go back to Amelia?" he asked, already knowing the answer.
Sam nodded. "Yeah."
He'd told his brother it was one or the other. He couldn't have both. Like a child delivering an ultimatum in the school yard. He didn't even know why he'd done it that way, or felt that way. The emotions that had been churning in him, since Dean had disappeared, since he'd gotten back, none of them made sense now.
Since they'd been kids, dragged around the country, he'd made friends easily and quickly, and Dean had been mistrustful and a loner, most of the time. But he realised, the friends Dean had made, they'd been important to him, and they'd stayed through the years. Not many, not many at all, but necessary. Essential. And Dean had lost them, one by one.
The slur of a foot through the leaf fall snapped both men's attention back to the woods and they stepped backward automatically, closer together. Sam felt the weight of the stone blade in his hand, fingers closing around the half and the muscles in his forearm jumping as the tip lifted.
Shadows moved beneath the trees and Sam stared at them, eyes widening a little as he saw them emerge, two and then five … and then eight. Grey skin, pouched and puckered and the fluttering rags covering them the same dull colour. Deep-set eyes, glittering a little as they roamed avariciously over the two men. Sharpened sticks and thick clubs held in bony hands. Blackened teeth revealed as the lips drew back over them.
"Ghouls?" Bobby whispered behind him and Sam grunted confirmation.
Bobby looked down at the knife in his hand and swallowed. He was going to be hard-pressed to take off many heads with it.
The ghouls shuffled forward, closer, spreading out as they formed a loose circle around the men. Then they attacked.
Sam swung the blade, taking off the first head and ducking under a long arm, feeling the filthy nails scrape along his neck. He reversed the swing and felt the blade bite into something behind him, straightening and turning and pulling it free from the mostly severed neck. Something jumped onto his back, a gust of rotten meat smell blew along his face and he pitched himself forward, landing on the creature and hearing bones break beneath him. Distantly, he could hear Bobby's harsh panting, and a shout of pain but another ghoul was on him, and he was struggling to keep the point of the stake it held from driving through his eye.
A fierce, guttural snarl filled the clearing and Sam felt the creature on him plucked away, shrieking as its throat was ripped wide open, the noise ceasing abruptly as the body was cast to one side. He scrambled to his feet, turning to take the head from the ghoul that was fastened to Bobby's shoulder, kicking aside the body and hauling the old man to his feet. A dark shape moved past, too fast to make out, and another ghoul fell, head attached to the body by a thin flap of skin, dark blood pooling from jaw to collarbone, nothing left in between.
Bobby lifted the knife as the dark shape bent over the last ghoul, and Sam's hand flashed out, gripping the old man's wrist and pulling him back.
"No! Bobby, wait, wait," Sam shouted, dragging his arm down.
Benny lifted his head, spitting out a mouthful of blood and flesh, and turned to look up at them.
"Why are you here?" Sam asked, knowing the answer, feeling it like a avalanche against everything he'd believed for the last year.
"Dean sent me," Benny said, grinning at him, bloodied fangs filling his mouth.
Bobby stared at the vampire. Sam hadn't been kidding, he thought dazedly. There was one way for a vamp to get here. And the creature in front of them had trusted Dean Winchester enough to let him do it.
Benny got to his feet, looking around the clearing, smiling a little as his teeth retracted. The sense of familiarity was so powerful it almost felt like coming home. He turned and looked at the man and the soul, gesturing to the trail that led to the north – or what would be north if Purgatory had a pole.
"C'mon, Dean's gonna be waiting for us at the other end, and we've got a trek to get to the gateway."
He walked away and Sam looked at Bobby. The older hunter shrugged and started walking after the vampire. Sam looked around and followed him.
How had it been down here, for that much time, really, he wondered? His nerves were crawling with tension and he could feel the adrenalin surges coming and going. Most of the monsters in here couldn't be killed with a simple axe or knife, his brother was resourceful, but … he shook the thought off, hurrying up the trail after them.
Benny looked at the hills as they came up the ridge and stopped where the trees thinned out. He needed the glass and the bone and the amber, but he had a feeling that they wouldn't be all that difficult to get this time around. If they could get to the compound. Or what was left of it. Glancing at the two beside him, he thought he couldn't let them see everything. Dean hadn't told his brother what had happened down here, he was sure of that. Wouldn't have wanted to. Couldn't have.
He nodded and kept walking, following the tree line around the curve of the hillside. The lamia wouldn't have moved territory. The memory brought a slight smile. They would go around this time. Without the human interference, he thought they could use the dry valley to cross to the other side, get there in half the time. Hell, a quarter of the time since he didn't have Dean agitating about finding the damned angel.
"Dean said the angel got out?" he asked Sam, flicking a sideways glance at the tall hunter walking beside him.
Sam nodded. "Pulled out by angels, apparently."
"Good."
"Are we likely to run into the leviathans?"
Benny tilted his head, looking up at the non-sky overhead. "Hard to say. We saw them but they were after the angel. I'd only seen them distantly before he arrived."
That was something, Sam thought tiredly. "Benny, listen, I know you saved my brother's ass a few times down here, and I respect that –"
Benny turned to look at him. "And now I'm saving yours."
He stopped on the trail, looking at Sam. "I'm a disgrace to my own kind, how 'bout that?"
"Why? Why did you do it?" Sam's brow creased up in bewilderment.
"Dean asked," Benny said, turning away and walking.
Just like that, Sam thought. Dean had asked. And whatever the bond was between the two of them, Benny had trusted him enough, had cared about him enough to say yes. Had he ever commanded a loyalty like that, he wondered? The answer was blindingly obvious and he shook his head, feeling his throat tighten. Of course he had. From Dean.
Heaven
Naomi sat behind the glass desk, her eyes closed as she watched. The oldest Winchester was resourceful, she thought remotely. Resourceful and mistrustful and likely to be a problem, when things became more complicated. She could see why Castiel was so dedicated to him, though. He saw problems and solutions in a very straightforward way, breaking them down and dealing with them one by one, as they cropped up. He would never give up Castiel, she knew, not even if he was ambivalent about the angel, not even if he was confused about whether she'd been telling the truth.
She hadn't lied to him about his loyalty. It was admirable and although it was going to be a pain in her ass somewhere down the line, she could see why he'd been chosen, been pulled from Hell. Not just because of the prophecy, but because of who he was. Because of what he would do.
Crowley was agitating down there as well, knowing that what the Winchesters were doing was portentous, uncertain of how to stop them. It was time he was reminded that Hell existed by God's decree, not the other way around. She sniffed slightly. She still didn't know how the human-born crossroads demon had managed to claim the throne. It was worth investigating.
US-26, Maine
The highway travelled north-east, taking Dean back to an interstate that would lead north nearly all the way. The headlights delineated his world, the white lines on the black asphalt and the signs and markers and mileposts going by in a never-ending stream of information he absorbed without thought.
Tiredness came and went in waves. He thought he was on his third or fourth wind now, having pushed through the deep patches of fatigue, ignoring his body's requests for sleep, for rest, telling himself he could rest once Sam and Benny were back up here, safe and the trial was finished.
It hadn't occurred to him until he'd crossed into New York state that Sam might kill Benny down there. The thought had persisted right through the next two hundred miles. He thought that they'd found a way to accept what had happened, thought his brother had understood what the vamp had meant to him. He still wasn't completely sure about it, but he didn't think Sam'd be so stupid as to kill his only way out.
Of course, his brother could be trapped in Hell, or dead down there and then Benny would again be trapped in Purgatory, and he'd be standing in a patch of woods waiting for something that would never happen. He shoved those thoughts aside. Sam would make it out, with Bobby. And Benny could ride out with him. And things would be different.
The vampire's face, when he'd been telling him about not fitting, not finding anywhere to fit, rose in his mind and his fingers tightened around the steering wheel. Benny hadn't gone rogue, all those months he'd left him alone. He'd hung on somehow, he told himself fiercely. It wasn't enough that he could do it with someone watching him. He'd had to do it on his own. He hadn't realised how hard it would be for him. Hadn't realised how close Benny had come to wanting to give up.
It would be different now.
In the back of his mind, the part that was pragmatic and practical, that saw problems clearly and came up with solutions to fit them, he wondered if it could be.
Purgatory
Bobby's nose wrinkled up as the pungent fumes were carried with the smoke from the bowl into the air. He watched curiously as the vampire picked up the bowl of ash, dropping the fat into it and stirring the resultant thick paste with a finger.
"You remember what I told you?" Benny asked Sam.
Sam nodded, turning to Bobby. "You ready? When we get up top, it's gonna be an express to Heaven – no time for goodbyes," he warned him.
Bobby's mouth quirked. "Already said goodbye to you once. Didn't seem to take."
Sam drew the sigil over his arm, and over Bobby's chest, his face screwing up as he inserted the long sliver of obsidian into both. Red-gold light filled Bobby, swirling for a moment under his skin, then was dragged deep inside Sam's arm, the pain of the transfer drawing a deep groan from between Sam's clenched teeth.
"Your turn, Benny," Sam said, wiping the sweat from his face and turning to the vampire.
"No."
Sam frowned at him. "What do you mean – no?"
"I mean I ain't comin', Sam," Benny said, glancing up at the hills that surrounded them. "I mean that I can't go back."
"What? Why?"
"Because … because there's nothing there for me," the vampire said, shrugging. "Dean wants to be there, but he can't. He's got other things to do. And I can't – I don't – I don't think I can keep holding on up there."
"Benny, Dean needs you," Sam said, stepping toward him. "He needs a friend. Someone he can trust. Someone who's never let him down."
The vampire looked down at the ground. "Dean kept me human, Sam, and down here, maybe I did the same for him." He looked up again. "But up there, he's got you. And sooner or later, I would let him down. Worse than he could imagine. So … no."
The crackling noise came from the edge of the woods and Benny's head snapped around. He hadn't really believed Sam would do it, until that moment, had thought the man might find a way to leave him behind, or kill him. He'd been wrong. Sam was Dean's brother, after all.
"Benny, whatever you think, I can't leave you here," Sam said, his gaze flicking along the edge of the trees. "We'll figure it out when we're home, okay?"
Three figures walked out from under the trees, strolling almost as they came closer. Even from this distance, Sam could smell them, rotten flowers and decomposing meat and he saw their pale, hard skin.
"Benny … where've you been?" the leader said, grinning with a mouthful of glistening, pointed fangs.
Benny looked at them, and back to Sam, mouth lifting up on one side. "Time for you to go, Sam."
"Benny –"
"Go on, now, Sam," Benny said, walking away from him, toward the vampires. "Go on."
Sam hesitated, looking at the bowl over the fire. He couldn't leave the vampire here. Dean wouldn't understand.
"Benny – please," he said, looking at the vampire, past him to the others.
"No," Benny said. "You be sure to tell Dean that I said goodbye. I was never any good up there anyway."
"Wait!" Sam grimaced and threw the stone blade to him. The vampire caught it one-handed, turning the catch into a turn, the turn into a swing as the three attacked.
Sam lit the bowl and watched the flames shoot up, changing colour. The slit in the air appeared and widened and he looked back at the vampire, his guttural snarl roaring through the open air, his movements blurred with speed, with economy and efficiency.
In front of him, the slit was wide enough to pass through and Sam swallowed, dragging in a deep breath and launching himself through it.
Hundred Mile Wilderness, Maine
Dean walked back and forth through the forest, glancing at his watch. He'd been here an hour and there'd been nothing.
Stop freaking, he told himself, feeling the clamminess of his cooling sweat down his back. It took you months to get out of the place. Give 'em some time.
All good advice, but he couldn't take it. Couldn't stop the feeling that something had gone wrong.
The burst of light filled the tiny clearing and he swung around, seeing Sam's unmistakable silhouette climbing out of it, his brother staggering and stumbling through the deadfalls that littered the space under the trees as the light died behind him.
For a heartbeat, he wasn't sure it was Sam and he waited, his pulse hammering against his ribs, all the fear he'd held back for the last forty hours coursing through him. Then he heard Sam's panting breath, saw his face in the thin moonlight and he stepped forward, pulling his brother close and holding him tightly. It was okay. It was going to be okay. The thought drummed through his head over and over and he finally felt it might be true.
He let him go, stepping back to look at him. In Sam's eyes, a lot had changed, he thought.
"Purgatory, right?" Dean said, forcing down the mass of feeling. "Real garden spot, ain't it?"
"Yeah," Sam said. He didn't know what to say to Dean. Didn't know where to start.
"Did you get them out?"
"Only Bobby," Sam said, his face crumpling a little as he looked at Dean.
"What?" Dean stared at him, trying to get his head around what Sam had said, trying not to think that Benny hadn't made it. "I mean, that's fantastic about Bobby –"
"Dean … uh, Benny … he got us out," Sam said slowly. "A bunch of vamps showed and he – he used himself as bait."
Of course. Naturally, Dean thought. Because he'd asked him to save Sam. And save Sam was exactly what Benny would do.
"He told me that he didn't – he didn't want to come back. Said that no matter what happened, he couldn't fit here. He said to tell you goodbye." Sam continued. He saw his brother's face close up, saw him pull back, somewhere inside. "I'm sorry."
He hadn't, Dean thought, hadn't wanted to come back. Not enough to want to try it again. See if they could figure out a way to make it work up here. It was simple down there. Simple and pure. Kill or be killed. No shades of grey. No wanting things you couldn't ever have. He swallowed his grief and shoved the thoughts away, looking back up at Sam.
"Right." He pulled in a breath, forcing himself to think of what else, what next. "So … uh Bobby, how'd he hold up down there?"
Sam watched the transition, knowing now what was going on behind the tension in Dean's face, knowing that this was another wound, something else that wouldn't heal up and leave Dean alone. Knowing that his brother couldn't or wouldn't talk about it, not now. Probably not ever.
He nodded, pushing his regret aside. "He's good, all things considered. Ornery as hell, of course."
"As he should be," Dean said, forcing himself a little further from the pain. "Let's put that old man where he belongs."
"Yeah," Sam said, tucking his knife under his arm as he pulled up his sleeve.
Dean looked down at the glowing light that lay beneath Sam's forearm. Carrying souls around was getting to be old hat, he thought irrelevantly.
The knife sliced through his brother's skin and Sam murmured the words of the spell of release. The soul burst free of his flesh, changing from red-gold to blue-white at the moment it rose.
How can we see it, Dean wondered as he watched it rise through the canopy of bare branches. How the hell can we see the things we see?
The light stopped at the top of the trees, disappearing in a thick, dark cloud above them.
"What the hell –?" Dean stared up.
"Moose and Squirrel, what a coincidence," Crowley's voice came from behind them.
They turned to see him standing at the edge of the clearing. "Bobby Singer," Crowley said smugly, looking up at the soul trapped within the charcoal coils of his demons. "I'd know you anywhere."
"Let him go, Crowley," Dean said, his face stony. "He doesn't belong in Hell!"
Crowley looked at him, smiling. "Ah but we all know that doesn't mean much, don't we, boys? Those angels you're so fond of don't seem mind a little horse-trading, when it suits them."
He smiled and shook his head a little as their bodies tensed. "Really?"
The gesture was small, the movement it directed not so much. Dean and Sam were lifted and slammed into tree trunks, four feet from the ground, held immobile, their bones creaking as the demon increased the pressure.
Crowley looked up and the soul was brought down. Then it stopped. He frowned at it, and dropped his gaze, seeing Naomi standing on the other side of the clearing, her mouth curving up in an expression that couldn't really be described as a smile.
"Oh, come on!" he growled at her.
"Let me see if I've interpreted this situation correctly," she said, throwing a fast glance at the two men before looking back at the demon. "The Winchesters have freed an innocent soul from Hell, to which you are wrongfully trying to return it."
Crowley scowled at her. "Siding with them now, Naomi? You don't know those two. Before they're done, we'll both be locked away."
"I'm just looking forward to them locking you away, dear," she said lightly.
"Bureaucrat!" he spat at her. "You're fighting outside your weight class."
Naomi's face froze at the insult, the muscle in the point of her vessel's jaw twitching.
"Don't call me a bureaucrat!" she ground out, lifting her hand toward him as her summoned the power of Heaven and her vessel filled with light. Crowley vanished, the air popping as it filled the position where he'd stood, and the light faded away. Dean and Sam fell to the ground.
Looking up, Naomi watched the demons trapping the soul moving in panic-stricken twisting spirals as she lifted her hand. Naomi pointed at them and they vanished entirely, the soul of Bobby Singer rising quickly, unimpeded now, into the sky.
She kept her gaze on the soul until it'd disappeared, lowering her hand and turning to look at the two men. "I told you could trust me," she said.
Dean shook his head as the clearing filled with restless sound of beating wings and returned to silence. He couldn't. He never would. Heaven wanted the Hell gates closed. Didn't mean they were on the same side.
He looked at his brother. Sam was staring back at him. "What the hell was that about?"
"I'll tell you later, let's get this trial done," Dean said, waving his hand in an impatient gesture.
Sam nodded, pulling the spell from his pocket and dragging in a deep breath before he started to read it.
"Ga na haam dar."
The pain struck immediately this time, white-hot knives stabbing into his muscles, into his joints, from elbow to fingertips. His hand sprang open and the paper fluttered to the ground as he doubled over and dropped to his knees.
What the –? Dean stepped close to him, watching Sam's hand shaking, shudders rippling fast through his brother's frame.
"Sam?" He leaned close, his hand closing over Sam's shoulder and gripping tight. "Sam! Talk to me! What?"
Sam's hand was rigid, fingers bent and curled. He couldn't see why. Couldn't see anything causing it. This had happened the last time, he thought wildly.
"It's okay, it's okay," Sam gasped out, holding his forearm against the agonising burning inside of his hand. He could see the light in it, could see the bones and tendons standing out, silhouetted against it. It wasn't going, he thought, his eyes screwing shut. It wasn't fading.
Then it did.
He flexed his fingers, letting out the breath he'd been holding in a series of sharp moans, the light dying away and the pain disappearing until he couldn't even remember how it'd felt. Ducking his head, he felt his skin return to normal, his hand working properly now, the sweat dripping off his face onto his arm.
"It's okay," he said, looking at Dean's drawn face and away. "I'm fine. It's done."
Dean stared down at him. Not fucking okay, and certainly not fucking fine, he thought, his pulse settling slowly as Sam's voice returned to its usual timbre.
"It's done," Sam said again, hoping he sounded reassuring. He glanced up at him, aware that his heartbeat had slowed back to a normal tempo, the final faint tingling in his nerves dissipating.
"What happened?" Dean said.
"I don't know what it is," Sam told him, honestly enough, he thought as he looked down at his arm. "Some kind of … confirmation, maybe? That the spell worked? That the trial was done properly?" He shook his head. "It's a – there's a light, I can see it. And a lot of pain. Then it goes."
"I didn't see a light, Sam," Dean countered, his voice deep, worried. "Why didn't you tell me about this, the first time?"
"Because I didn't know what it was then either, Dean," Sam said, shifting his weight to his foot and getting up. "Where the –"
He saw the paper, lying trapped against a branch on the ground a few feet away. Walking away, he bent and picked it up, tucking it back into his jacket.
"It doesn't last long," he said, turning around. "And it doesn't seem to do anything permanent."
Dean's mouth twisted. "Oh … so you were coughing up blood before you completed the first trial?"
Sam dropped his gaze. "I don't know what that is either," he said quietly.
"There's a shitload we don't know, Sam." Dean looked away. "Maybe we better figure some of it out before it kills you."
Warsaw, Missouri
Kevin leaned over the sink, painting the last of the symbols over the glass of the windows. He'd found the wards on the tablet, protection against the ruler of Hell.
So tired of this, aren't you, Kevin? The fear. The hiding. The wondering if you're finally losing your mind?
He snapped upright, the brush falling from nerveless fingers into the sink.
"Just a dream," he muttered to himself, looking uneasily around the dim cabin. The lights were off, he was using candles to enhance the warding spell. The pills had stopped Crowley's voice. It meant … it meant that it had to have just been a dream. Couldn't be real. Couldn't be Crowley. "Just … a dream."
Behind him the symbols flickered, lighting up and fading away, each burst of light making them thinner, more translucent. Kevin spun around, his eyes widening as he watched them begin to disappear. He could hear something, something deeper, something higher, a wailing and moaning that seemed to be coming from everywhere.
The souls of Hell are a power source, Kevin … torture, the old-fashioned way, that releases the power … and the power is infinite …
The thick glass fractured, cracks running across, down, more and more of them as the glass seemed to flutter with the frequency of the voices. He dropped, spinning away as they shattered, the shards blowing inwards, the voices suddenly much louder.
"No! No, this is just a dream!" Kevin screamed as he crawled away to the far side of the cabin.
A tearing, shrieking noise came from the hull, from the decks and cabin top. He looked up and saw the metal torn apart, through the devil's trap and the sigils painted there, lifted and twisted by a monstrous force he couldn't see directly. Everywhere he looked, the ship was being ripped, the high-pitched, torturous whining of the stressed steel drilling into his ears, into his mind.
It stopped and the silence rang in his ears. The candles blew out, all together, a wind sweeping through the cabin and vanishing. He looked up slowly, unwillingly, and saw Crowley standing beside the companionway, hands in his pockets.
"Kevin Tran," the demon said with a small sigh. "It's been quite a while. Can't say that you're looking good, Kev, because frankly, you look like hell."
Kevin stared at him hopelessly. If this wasn't a dream, he was going to die. He wasn't sure that it wouldn't be a relief.
"How did you find me?"
"There's always a way," Crowley said, lifting his hand and examining his fingernails. "If you can't find one Tran … you find another."
Death would've been easy, Kevin thought as the words registered. Nothing was ever that easy.
"Your mother, Kev," Crowley said, his voice holding a false thread of sympathy. "Quite a pain threshold, that one. She didn't want to give you up, of course, but even she could only take … so much."
"She never would've told you," Kevin said, breathing faster as the oxygen seemed to disappear from the room.
Crowley shrugged. "No, you're quite right. She didn't. We killed her and got your address off her Smartphone."
"NO!" Kevin screamed at him, backing blindly away, feeling the sharp stab of twisted metal behind him.
Waiting for the boy's breath to run out, Crowley stared around the cabin.
"All done?" the demon asked politely when the scream had trailed away to nothing. "People come and go, Kevin. Most of them unnoticed. You, on the other hand, well, you were responsible for saving the world, that's something. Cheer up, mate, at least I want you alive."
"I'll NEVER help you!"
"Ah … well, never's a long time, isn't it?" Crowley said thoughtfully. "And we both know that your pain threshold, well, nowhere near your lately-departed mother's. So … let's talk about what you've been feeding to the Winchesters, shall we?"
I-70 W, Indiana
Dean rubbed a hand over his forehead. He was just about on empty, but they had to get back to Missouri. He'd stop soon, he told himself. Soon. Everything that had happened. It was too much, he knew. Too much to think about right now. Too much to deal with. He'd need time for it. Time to get it straight.
Sam hadn't spoken for the last three hours, falling asleep for the first seven, not even noticing when he'd pulled over to bury the vampire. He glanced at him.
"You okay?"
"Yeah, I'll live."
Dean chewed on the corner of his lip for a moment, not sure if he should raise the subject or not. He'd promised Sam he'd be honest with him. He guessed this fell into that category.
"I buried Benny," he said, the statement coming out abruptly, his gaze remaining fixed to the road ahead. "But I didn't burn his bones."
Sam turned to look at him, surprised by the admission. Surprised Dean was telling him.
"I know you got no use for him, but –"
"No, no, no. You know what, I get it," Sam interrupted quickly. "I do. He's … uh … he's different from what I thought. And … I'm sorry. Sorry I didn't trust you on that. Sorry I didn't want to listen."
The silence stretched out between them, both lost in their thoughts. Dean was surprised, surprised that Sam had seen what he'd seen, more surprised that he'd admitted, out loud, that he'd been wrong.
He pulled in a breath. "Alright, let's go see prophet-boy and find out where he's stashed that tablet," he decided. He would need a lot of time to work through what had happened. And they didn't have that time now.
Sam nodded.
Warsaw, Missouri
The boat, Fizzle's Folly, lay quietly against the dock. No lights showed in the cabins and neither man could hear anything other than the very soft lap of the water against the sides.
Dean looked over the sigils, the traps and wards and guards as they climbed on board, moving together to the forward hatch and going below. Everything looked intact. He wondered if Kevin was actually getting some sleep for a change.
"Kevin? It's us," he said, opening the door to the main cabin and stepping through. The place was dark, and he pulled out his flashlight, flicking it on and shining the beam around the room. Something was different, he thought, the nerves prickling up the back of his neck. "Kevin!"
He found the light switch and flipped it on, turning slowly around and looking at the bare, clean, empty cabin.
"He's gone," Sam said, walking from Garth's cabin back into the main room.
Dean looked at the dishes, neatly stacked in the drainer. At the clean counters and tidy shelves and the stripped bunk in the aft cabin. There wasn't a shred of paper anywhere to be seen. Every sigil, symbol, trap and guard was in place. Nothing was disturbed.
"He took all his stuff – his notes, the books –" Sam said, turning around and looking at the room.
"Well, we saw this coming," Dean said quietly. "Finally freaked. Little geek made a run for it."
Sam's brow creased up. "Yeah, but where?"
Dean looked at him. "And that's the sixty-four dollar question."