December, 28th 2013

I don't own any of the characters, CW and Eric Kripke do!

Beta for this Chapter: Ashqtara

A/N: Hey there my loyal readers :)

Soo, this is a thing now, weekly update, yay :D I hope you will enjoy this chapter, I at least did, especially...oh you can guess which part ;P Also, yay longer chapter!

LegendaryArimaspi: Mh, you may be right about those things..;P Also no, no spoilers ^^

Ky111 and Girl-of-Action (and the other comments about Dean's awareness): It's interesting, I actually wanted the denying thing to work like most of supernatural plots do: with them somehow knowing something's up but not really pushing the button and addressing it. So in case Dean doesn't word it, yeah, he knows. He's just not admitting it to himself. And you know how often they avoid conflict to fit the bigger picture. Bobby does want to confront Dean. But he knows right now is not the right time. Okay, author out, sorry.

Btw yes, I do read all the reviews. I'm sorry for not responding individually but I really dislike the PM system of . I know that sounds lame but I will answer questions you ask this way if that's okay, that way everybody can read them :) PMs on private behalf are always welcome though ^^.

Now please enjoy :3

Chapter 8

In the morning light let my roots take pride
Watch me from above like a vicious ghost

Yahoel was certainly enjoying herself. If she as honest, she hadn't had this much fun since leaving heaven. Stupid Micheal and his stupid rules…scolding her for torture. As if he was so much better sometimes. At least his younger brother didn't mind giving her the opportunity at a little fun once in a while.

Sam Winchester was lying on the floor before her, bloody and beaten. The special girl was in the next room, being prepared. Everything was going to plan and she would have the honor of finishing Sam herself. There wasn't much left of him, though. She sighed, seeing the end of her little enjoyment already coming, when the fallen angel suddenly heard a noise.

Gunshot.

Damnit, what were those idiots of demons doing? Was that the brother? The other Winchester whom the angels had their eyes on for so long? She knew that at some point, her little illusion would fall apart. She had planned on Sam thinking his big hero brother was dead so he would make her life a bit easier as well as more enjoyable, just so she could see him suffer a little more. Mental torture was so much better than physical. And harder to master, too. The demons sometimes had no idea what to do in these situations. Creating a fake of Dean's gun had been easy for Yahoel, once taught under Gabriel to master minor illusions and she had enjoyed Sam's facial expression when facing the possibility of having to experience that loss all over again.

More gunshots next door. She sighed, kicking the younger Winchester one more time. Her head tilted with satisfaction as she heard a crack and his heart rate slow down. Wonderful. Almost done…

"Hey, ugly. Get the hell away from him or you're one more salt-filled turkey." the deep and pissed off voice was filling the room and Yahoel smiled gleefully. Another Winchester to kill. What a day…

"Dean Winchester. What a pleasure." she said without turning around. Calmly, she kneeled down, feeling Sam's pulse. Not that she needed to. But Dean didn't need to know that. "You're too late anyway." she claimed. The shot to her side surprised her. He had pulled the trigger as soon as she had stopped moving and she felt herself stagger from the sheer force of the shotgun. Of course, it didn't hurt or anything. Still.

"Ouch." she said sarcastically, still not turning. But then there was a rumbling in the man's throat, a change in the atmosphere of the room and the discharged angel kneeling on the floor whirled around, wide eyed, at the next string of words.

"I said get the hell away from him, Yahoel." her eyes now stared at the man in the door frame. He knew her name. He knew…h-how? His silhouette was dark, almost black against the dimming light that was flooding through the only window. With every second, her eyes widened more and suddenly, she felt herself trembling, feeling the presence, being pressed to the ground by its mere weight. For a moment, Dean Winchester seemed confused, then his expression flickered back to deadly serious, mad, furious, righteous.

And the righteous man shall rise from the pit and-

"N-no. Y-you can't be here." she whispered and then she was stumbling, crawling, away from him. Shadows were moving along the wall behind the man, giant ones, ones she hadn't seen since serving him. And she felt afraid again for the first time in eons.

Finally, he was in front of her, blade raised, and expression merciless.

"You shouldn't have done that." and without explaining what in heaven he was talking about, the man struck her down, burning her grace with one stroke while she had found herself unable to move a single inch.

~.~.~.~

Dean's insides felt like ribbons right now. And those ribbons were being played with by a fucking tiger. Upon entering the hut, he had changed from panic to complete calm to utter fury and he had to admit, striking demons down like that like it was nothing was…different. He didn't know how he did it, if he was honest, them being fast and strong and all. But just as with the Vampires, he didn't question and just do, just kill, so they couldn't do any harm any more. Abby was a sight to behold alright, and a sight to panic at as well. He tried to give her as much medical attention and overlook as he could but she should be alright, with the right equipment. In his mind, the name of his brother was flooding his brain.

Sammy, Sam, Sam, Sammy. Please be alright, goddamn, please.

Dean Winchester rarely begged. But if these demons did anything to his little brother, he was going to rip their fucking lungs out. The worry was drowning him, like his emotions were just heightened like never before, he wasn't even able to really pull them in and hold them from actually showing on his face, like he normally could. Just like he had hidden the hurt over what happened in heaven or like he had hidden his decision to go to Michael after all. For his brother. Without him knowing. Which was really the tricky part. He didn't want to lie to Sammy any more. And maybe that was the mistake here as well. What If these bastards made him say yes? What if this was it? Maybe this wasn't Detroit, but what if this was the turning point? If they did anything to waver his brother's faith in whatever was keeping him upright and away from that bastard Lucifer right now, he didn't know what he would do. It was all on him, again. And he had to prevent it, he just had to. That future should not come to pass, damnit!

And then he saw it. His brother's body bloody and beaten on the floor and he just lost it. Not like he would have thought he would, though. His brain just shut down completely, blacking him out for the whole of several seconds, maybe minutes. He remembered yelling at the thing, he remembered somehow knowing that it was an angel and not a demon, knowing its name… the next thing he knew there was the angel sword from his sleeve driven through the heart of the creature and the light as blinding but it wasn't hurting him. He was staring at it but he didn't turn blind.

Moments later, his knees crashed to the floor beside Sammy. His fingers, trembling and not at all calm any more, were searching for a point not covered in blood, something to hold on to, and after a little fidgeting, found his brother's shoulders.

"Sam! SAMMY!" he yelled at the top of his lungs.

His baby brother didn't move. There was a faint heartbeat, he could hear it. But it wasn't steady enough, it was fading with every second and his brother was bleeding out all over the goddamn floor, all over his arms and there was nothing he could do, nothing that could be done, nothing.

"No, no no nono no. Not again. Don't do this to me. Come on. Don't let them get you again. Come on, look at me, man. We have to walk through this together, right? Team Free Will? Beat those bastards to where they all came from and then some? I can't do it alone, man. Not like this. Not now." he denied that that tear actually existed right there. Or the next one. Or the one after that. Before he knew it, Sammy was against his own chest and he was feeling his heartbeat getting faint, actually sensing his brother breathing weakly against his short hair, weeping from the pain that movement cost him.

"No. Please, God. If the angels are right and you're out there…" but he stopped himself and took a deep breath. No, he was NOT going to pray now. He should be doing what he knew how to do: Take care of Sammy. So he took a deep, very deep double breath and steadied his brother on the floor, did what the medical training told him to and shoved the damn angel aside that was getting in his way with her dead limps and charcoal drawings all over the fucking floor.

The calm in his chest was returning. Like a blanket, wrapping around him in comfort. He didn't know why, his brother was dying here for heaven's sake.

But as if on instinct, he reached out, stroked the damp skin on his brother's forehead, touching the cut skin there and almost got a heart attack…

~.~.~.~

Waking up was a really strange experience. He felt warm and safe, a soft surface underneath him. A big part of him had expected pain and hurt to be the first thing he noticed, not his brother's presence beside him, radiating warmth and the feeling of belonging like a damn beacon.

Sam opened his eyes to the soft noise of moving tableware from a kitchen in the distance. Kitchen? Where the hell was he?

"Dean?" was the first thing he asks, even though it comes out more as 'dn' than anything else, just as when he was a kid and really sick and couldn't speak right. Except he felt fantastic, his tongue a little strange and mushy maybe but otherwise fine. Which was mysterious enough, considering the last thing he remembered.

"Oh, Cinderella graces us with her presence."

"It's Sleeping Beauty."

"What?"

"The one with the sleep, that was-"

"Whatever, Sammy." Dean waved his lecture in Fairy Tale lore away but he couldn't hide the grin creeping onto his face. He leaned over him and examined his face, just as Sam put him in focus now, drinking in his presence. God, was he glad to see him! The angel had lied, the bitch had lied after all. And boy, he'd never been so relieved that somebody had lied to him. Dean was fine, fine, fine…

"How're you feeling?" his brother's eyebrow was raised but there was something in his voice, in his green eyes, something…off. But the smile was so real that Sam just dismissed it. He was too freaking glad to see him to care about anything else at this moment.

"Fine, actually. Considering an angel made me her playtoy for a couple of what, hours?" he suggested and waved around while casually sitting up. He stared down at himself. Wow. He had to either be on really good painkillers or hallucinating. Where the hell was the pain? He had to be covered in wounds! There had been slashes, cuts and burns all over him…

"Oh, that's what you were dreaming? No wonder you were so worked up." his brother suddenly responded, but it sounded strange. Dream? Wait just one second…

"Dream? Oh no, Dean, that wasn't a dream. I don't think I can imagine that kind of-"

"Well, I did find you like this in the hut. Perfectly fine but strapped down to a rag where they seemed to have you on some kind of drug…probably to have you say yes? Abby was strapped down too but they tortured her instead. Or made her into some kind of ritual part, I don't know. You should see her stomach, pretty messed up stuff. Better not talk to her about it." Was it just Sam or was Dean being dismissive? As if distracting him from something…was Abby really okay? Was he hiding something? Wait, maybe he was supposed to be in false security here. Maybe this wasn't even Dean…

The very persistent ringing of Dean's phone interrupted them.

"I swear, if Bobby calls one more time…", Dean mumbled and picked up, his fingers angrily flipping the thing open. No. Nobody was that good at playing his brother, the annoyed expression on his face, the flicker in his eyes when he was about to yell at Bobby but also fond of the worry the older hunter held for them. That was hardly anything you could fake and Sam knew his brother better than he did himself. It would be hard to play him on this. So Dean was really alive and well. He had been the one to find him, after all. Did he mention how glad he was that the fucking angel had been lying? He silently hoped Dean had killed her…

"What now?" his brother barked into the phone. But when the answer came, he fell silent and his green eyes widened, his angry expression falling. In an instant, he was on his feet and held the phone tight, like a lifeline.

"Cas? Wait, hold up- what?" a pause. Sam sat up straighter at hearing the angel's name. He was alive? Well that was a relief, after what he did to his body back there. God, he hadn't realized how worried he had been for the guy. Now seeing Dean's reaction to the call made him realize just how much they could have lost again. Another friend sacrificing themselves for their sakes, another one dead along the line, even if they had sworn that that was over with, if not a long time ago, at least after Jo and Ellen. Oh no, he shouldn't be thinking about that right now… The younger Winchester was just glad that Abby was okay, after all the screams he had heard of her. And apparently, Castiel was alive too, which was also good. Adam was at Bobby's, also surprisingly alive after their ordeal with Zachariah…Man, this was too much luck for them. Where was the hitch? Winchesters were never lucky…who would suffer for all of this? Sam took a few breaths and tried to listen to the conversation his big brother had on the phone with Castiel.

"Mh. Yeah. I know. No, I can't come there, we have a freaking hell knight rising here. Take a bus. Mh. Yes. Do you- oh. Okay. Yeah, good luck with that. Thanks." And he heard the phone being snapped shut. Dean stood outside for a moment, Sam could see him just outside the door with his back turned. He was thinking about getting up but Dean didn't appear to be in the touchy-feely mood right now so he thought about better staying in bed to rest up even though he didn't feel tired. If he was being honest, he felt better than he had in ages. No nightmares to boot, no injuries…

With Dean still looking at something on his phone, Sam looked down on himself. He was dressed in new clothes, weird enough. Something else was wrong…he couldn't quite put his finger on it…

"Yeah, we had to change you into something less soaked." Dean commented when he noticed Sam looking down upon himself. The younger Winchester looked up, eyebrows raised. He decided not to say something on that, after all it would involve talking about Dean changing him and he didn't want to think about that if it wasn't necessary.

"So…Cas is okay?" he asked, looking up to his brother with his typical worried-puppy gaze and Dean pursed his lips before sitting down on the sofa next to him again.

"No, actually. I mean, he's alive, yeah. But he called me from a hospital. Said he felt...human." he said and Sam could almost see the shudder going over Dean's spine. He could imagine why. If Cas felt human…that meant he had fallen. And that certainly wasn't 'okay' in their book. Not only for them, as having at least one angel on their side had been one of the good things about this war, but also for Castiel, because the guy had as good as no clue about how to be human at all, much less how to survive without his powers or how to behave or…well, anything. Dean took a deep breath before continuing.

"Only good news is that he could give me a clue about the hell knight thing. How to disrupt the circle they have made around the city. The one that's designed for the summoning." Sam raised an eyebrow. Circle? He had no clue what Dean was talking about. Suddenly, Abby was in the door, smiling. She looked astonishingly good for somebody who had been tortured just a few hours ago. Her belly was bandaged and she was wearing a top that didn't put any pressure on the wounds. Despite that and the cuts on her arm, she looked at Sam with a twinkle in her eyes that made Sam's attention immediately go completely to her. The huntress seemed to have that effect on him a lot, he fleetingly noted.

"Hey…you're okay. I heard you scream. I-I'm sorry I couldn't.." he interrupted himself, not knowing how to end his own sentence. I'm sorry I couldn't help you, I'm sorry I couldn't prevent you from getting dragged into all this…what? What would be enough to cover how guilty he felt? This was all on him, everything Lucifer did or his minions…he let him out. How could he possibly-

"It's not your fault, Sam. But that's not why I'm here. Dinner's ready." She said and nodded in the direction of the kitchen. Now that Sam was more careful about his surroundings, he noticed that the living room had been cleaned as far as possible, the blown out pieces of glass pushed into a corner for later cleanup and the research pinned to the wall where it had been tossed to the floor at the demon attack. Blood was whipped from most of the surfaces and he was lying on the sofa with a blanket on top of him, tugged in by Dean like he was still a little kid. He huffed inwardly. Would his brother ever change? Would he ever see that he was an adult now, able to take care of himself? But as much as Sam bitched about it, maybe he actually secretly enjoyed it. It was his brother's way of showing affection for him and taking care of him was one of the things that made Dean…well, Dean. How could he ever seriously ask him to give that up? Though he had feared for some time there…after the whole Lucifer thing and heaven…what had changed? Ever since they came out of that beautiful room, Dean seemed…different. Sam still didn't know how to put his finger on it. But he stood up now anyway, following Dean and Abby to the kitchen. On the way there, he stopped cold when he took a look at the research pinned to the living room wall. Wait…he didn't do all that. There was the whole summoning circle, every connection, basically freaking everything! Who-

"Dean? Did you and Abby finish the-"

"Mmmh, that smells delicious, Abby! You should have told me if you needed any help with this!" Dean interrupted him. Sam narrowed his eyes, wondering if it was on purpose, if Dean was avoiding his questions. But he let it slide and nodded in agreement.

"Yeah. It's not your responsibility, we could have just ordered pizza." Sam said, feeling guilty that she cooked for them even though she had been the victim in this apparently even more than Sam. She was the one in bandages! But Abby just shook her head and sat down with them.

"No, it's fine. I'm on strong pain meds, I don't even feel anything and I was bored, so I reorganized the kitchen, found some stuff to warm up and here we are. It wasn't a big deal. Now eat. I know you're starving." She said, suddenly grinning and pointing to the delicious looking dish in the middle of the table. Now that she pointed that out…Sam felt his stomach rumbling. And with a smile, he grabbed the spoon away from Dean and gave it to Abby.

"Invalids first." He said with a grin and enjoyed the pout that formed on his older brother's lips. He laughed and that was when it hit him. He knew what was different about Dean.

He seemed…content. Like a weight was lifted from his shoulders. He was less drawn inwardly, less on guard, less tense and he looked like he had slept better than he had in years, at least better than ever since hell. But if Sam thought back on the last few days now, he couldn't remember a single moment that Dean was asleep when he was awake. It was unusual because Dean normally went to bed before Sam, not after. Then there were the sudden speed drives, the vampire that drank his blood and burned from the inside…

The thought that formed in his head now was not a good one. The deduction his head produced was not something he wanted to think about, ever. When he finally got the spoon from Abby, he was still staring at his big brother. Dean looked up and frowned at his strange gaze.

"Hey, I know I'm pretty but maybe you should focus on the food instead of me. Plus, I think Abby would be more your type." A sheepish grin crept on his face and he winked at Abby, who strangely turned a light shade of pink. Sam frowned even more. That wasn't normally Abby's style, really. Not that he knew her very much. But she had seemed like the more closed up type before, not flirtatious. That was until Sam realized that the blush wasn't for Dean's wink but for what he was implying. And that was when the blush shot to his own cheeks. God, Dean. You're just impossible…

And just like that, the horrible deduction from before was completely forgotten. For now.

~.~.~.~

"You sure about this? Maybe we should wait for Bobby's back up after all."

"God, what's with you people and not trusting me today? We can do this. It's not that many demons left, most of them were with you and Abby. We should be fine."

"But what about the seal? Do you have a plan on how to break it yet?" Sam asked his brother from beside him, demon knife in hand and salt loaded shotgun in the other. Dean had the angel blade firmly clenched in his own right hand and he just smirked.

"I actually do." He grinned. Sam was suddenly annoyed. He threw his brother a bitchface.

"Care to share it with the class?" came a voice from Dean's other side. Abby was there, gun in hand and an eyebrow lifted.

"First of all, you shouldn't be here. Secondly, no. Actually I don't want to share it. Let's just say I thought of a way to purify the souls." He said to Abby. It was only the next day, Abby was still all carved up and she shouldn't be hunting. The huntress ignored his comment and loaded her own shotgun with more bullets, rolling her brown eyes at him.

"And that would be what? Holy water?" Sam asked, mock in his voice. They were all speaking really low, crouching behind a fence and hoped that they wouldn't alert the demons inside the building. Dean's smug smile fell and Sam felt like strangling him.

"Seriously!? That's your plan? I can't believe you-"

"What? It's worth a try!" and the silent discussion went on. They had found out through Dean's and Bobby's research, confirmed by Cas later on, that the circle around the city was actually made of Baal's victims, the devoured souls of children and the ones turned to dust, crumbled into little pieces and scattered around in a giant summoning around the city. Nobody could actually see it though and that was the problem. Dean said he knew how to purify them. How do you purify something you can't see?

Abby interrupted them.

"Hey! Dammit. I'm glad that you two are so ready to fight each other but it would be really convenient if you could, I don't know, focus the anger at the demons inside that building?" she suggested in a tone that left no room for discussion. And, astonishingly enough, the two Winchester brothers fell in line. They nodded and finally, their little attack party made their way for the building.

The first few minutes went smoothly. They defeated several demons with their hand weapons, not firing the shotguns because that would alert all the others. Then they ran into an angel. Freaking angels, ruining everything.

"Ohh, the Winchesters. Both of them! And they even brought our sacrifice! Oh isn't this lovely!" and then he was behind Abby, fingers tearing at her bandage.

Dean felt like he wanted to tear something apart. Abby was screaming, the angel had pressed his hand to the markings on her belly and they had started glowing dangerously red. His lips began quivering in rage and he seriously felt like just killing the guy. It wasn't a problem. He felt the strength search through him, knew how to do it. But a glance at Sam told him he couldn't. His brother was already suspecting, he could tell. And even though he really wanted to help Abby, he had to find another way. So he came up with a plan…

It turned out he didn't need it though. As soon as Abby's scream sounded, her pain exploded and the red light from her belly swelled up, the angel flew away from her as if hit by an extremely strong force field. The angel seemed completely taken aback and Abby seemed just as shocked, looking down at her hands and then back up at Sam and Dean, a search for help in her eyes. Sam ran over and helped her up, checking if she was relatively okay to stand and then stepped between her and the angel.

The wave of demons surprised all of them. As soon as Abby was all powered up, there was a flood of demons surrounding them. Dean immediately started slashing, fighting, and saw Sam do the same. Shotguns were fired and in the middle of it, Dean found the time to finally stab the angel whore in the back, making him light up the room and take out several demons in the process. This deep hate for angels that had betrayed heaven was new for him but it was there, boiling under the surface of his skin. While Sam averted his eyes, he himself kept cutting, ignoring the bright light as if it didn't affect him. Abby almost sank to the floor, her glowing belly like a beacon in the room. She was clearly in pain but tried to keep her knees stable and use her shotgun against the demons before they got to Sam. The demons didn't touch her though, avoiding her altogether. Well, that was probably the only good thing coming out of it. Next thing he knew though, she was picked up by one of their enemies while Dean and Sam were fighting, and started kicking and screaming, shot the shotgun behind her but the demon was stubborn, hitting her hand and making her drop the gun altogether. The monster was forcing her to follow him to the next room, Abby not fully able to use her full strength yet. Dean gritted his teeth. Damnit.

"Split up! I'll cover Abby." He yelled to Sam, who had no real choice but to obey his suggestion. The older brother checked if the number of enemies was down enough for Sam to handle and decided that it was. So Dean ran for the next room, where more demons were coming from. Surprisingly enough, they didn't fight him but surrounded a sort of table that had all sorts of symbols on it. In the middle, there was something glowing. Orbs that were slowly being tinted black on the bottom, crumbling and finally turning to black, dirty dust. Like the one on he forest floor...

So that was the altar. Finally. The demon who had Abby dragged her over there and just dropped her before it. God, why hadn't he realized that the symbols on her belly meant something? Of course demons would do something as sick as make actually live soul sacrifices like this. He'd known that from his research earlier. But why her?

"You're too late, Winchester." A voice echoed through the building. It was chilling and deep, going to the very bone. It appeared to be coming from a man behind the altar, seated in a chair.

"I'm already present." It announced. And that was when the presence hit him. Dark, depressingly strong, pressing, bloody, utterly disgusting. It hit him and it left him unfazed.

"Baal." He growled under his breath, rage in his voice. The voice was silent.

"Why aren't you-" but the hell knight didn't have time before Dean was attacking. He was slashing through the demons, using the angel knife like an extension of his arm and using the newly given speed as well. The three demons that had been left in the room were down in seconds. It should be unnerving to him how easily he could fend off demons by now, the things that would normally throw him through a room and pin him to a wall with ease. But he bit his way through it, using the temporary advantage to get what he came here for –stopping the summoning. Finally, he sprayed the holy water from his jacket all over the altar. There was a hissing sound, giving the hunter hope it worked but...

Nothing happened.

Baal's laughter echoed through the building. He had the form of an older man, a man Dean now recognized, a sick feeling settling in his stomach. As the light from the altar intensified, he could see the creature sitting behind it, staring at him and Abby over the glow of the souls that were turning to dust. And suddenly, Dean felt like he was turning to dust himself...

It was Larry, Abby's mentor and surrogate father.

~.~.~.~

In the morning light let my roots take pride
Watch me from above like a vicious ghost
They don't see me come, who can blame them?
Never seem to catch my eye but I never wondered why

I won't fall asleep

I won't fall asleep

Higher, don't let 'em know we're coming

Higher, tiptoe higher

~Imagine Dragons, Tiptoe

Yes hello, that's it for now :D Remember Larry? I know I probably didn't mention him enough _.

So, like it, hate it? Tell me, no matter how short :3

Until next week!