Two weeks after Lucifer's cage was opened…

The sun was baking down on the Tuscan balcony where Zoey was sitting. She was slowly rocking in the beautiful, handmade rocker, and Murphy was curled in her lap. She stroked his thick fur while she thought.

The balcony she was occupying was owned by a wealthy Italian, whose body was cooling not ten feet from her. He had been a mobster, the worst kind of intimidator and murderer. His wealth had been soaked in blood, so Zoey had made sure to spill some of his.

And now, she rocked while she thought.

As she got older, she got wearier. She often found herself wondering if she was making a difference. If this was the way to incite change, to help people. She had righted many wrongs in blood, violence, and fear, but nothing ever seemed to actually change.

But now, with Lucifer walking the earth, maybe she could do some real good. She might not be around to see the good she had done, but that didn't bother Zoey very much.

"The world will probably be better off without me, anyway, Murph," she said idly as she continued to pet him.

Mrow.

xxxxxx

Zoey was surprisingly calm as she stood in the Kansas field that she would die in. She hadn't been terribly nervous to begin with, and her night with Castiel had banished any lingering fears. Now she was eager to get it over with.

She could do this. She could beat the devil. She just needed him there.

She smiled at the three men standing around her. They probably didn't even realize they'd taken up a protective stance around her. "Are we ready?" she asked cheerfully.

Sam ran his hands through his hair. "Not really."

Dean shook his head. "No."

Castiel stayed silent.

Zoey smiled. "That's really the best time to start, anyway. We're never going to feel ready." She paused and chuckled. "Well, you're never going to feel ready."

Dean frowned. "And you do?"

"Since the day I was born, quite frankly."

xxxxx

It wasn't because she was good. She had been telling the Winchesters the truth, that first night she'd met them.

Zoey talked a good game, and Father Thomas's faith in her had irrevocably changed her course. Because he had believed in people, she had fought for them. She always would, when the choice presented itself.

But, if she was going to be honest with herself, she had been biding time. Biding time until a fight worthy of her considerable power presented itself.

It was really just luck that the final test of her full strength had her firmly in the white, instead of in the grey where she'd lived her life so far.

xxxxx

Zoey watched as Castiel placed a hand on Sam's chest. The younger Winchester flinched, but stayed standing until the Enochian was scrubbed off of his ribs. Zoey nodded, her esteem of Sam rising. She'd done enough carving into ribcages to know that had to have hurt.

As soon as Castiel took his hand away, Zoey felt it, and her thoughts turned to the fight ahead. She couldn't help the way her breath caught, and she knew that if she'd been looking into a mirror, she would be able to watch her pupils dilate.

She turned away from the Winchesters and Castiel to look at one fallen archangel, wearing one rapidly deteriorating vessel.

She smiled. "Lucifer."

He tilted his head at her, a smile on his face, too. "You're new."

"I am."

"Ah," he said evenly, shaking a finger in the air. "You're the, ah, the little slut that the Winchesters hired to kill me."

Castiel almost growled behind her. Zoey threw a hand up and put a ward in front of him and the brothers. No, she thought in her angel's direction, let me do this.

Lucifer watched all of this with a smirk, then looked at Sam. "Sammy, Sammy, Sammy, this is pathetic, even for the two of you. I mean, hiring a half-breed? An abomination?" He tsked. "Pretty stupid, boys."

Lucifer took a step to his right, and Zoey swiveled infinitesimally to follow him. She could tell what he was doing, and part of her yearned to do the same. They wanted to circle one another, watching for weaknesses and flaws, like hunters. Like predators.

But she had something more important than posturing. She had the Winchesters, but more relevant, she had Castiel.

When Lucifer saw that she didn't move, he smirked, and a mean light came into his eyes. That was all right with Zoey. He thought that her protecting the Winchesters and Castiel was a weakness. And that was all right, too. He didn't need to know that it was the source of her strength.

"So what's the plan, kids?" Lucifer asked genially. "Summon me here, get the little Cambion to kill me, then ride off into the sunset?"

Zoey started to chuckle. She couldn't help it, it was probably a bad move, but she couldn't stop. Her power was purring at her, so ready to hurt the cocky bastard in front of her that it was, for once, in perfect sync with her. It knew what it would get from this battle, it was willing to wait.

Lucifer's head tilted again. "Have I amused you?"

She brought a hand up to cover her smiling lips. "I'm sorry, oh, I'm terribly sorry, how rude of me. It's just… You think I want to kill you."

When his face didn't change, she continued. "Oh, dear me, no. I'm not here to kill you. Of course, I can see why you would think that. Lots of people want to kill you."

This is it. It was coming. She felt fluid and loose and ready. She could do this. She would do this. She would protect the humans and the angel and she would take the archangel down. She was damn near giddy.

"And you don't? Want to kill me?"

Her smile became sly and slight, and her hand felt to her side. "Oh, Lucifer, no. I'm not hunting to kill."

She let a beat of silence pass, then, "I'm hunting for sport."

She launched herself at Lucifer, and quicker than she would have believed, he was attacking back.

Physically, they fought. He was good, fast, strong, but so was she. She'd spent almost a century studying martial arts, and the movements came to her without her having to summon them. Her body had memorized what to do, and she let it go.

Because her focus wasn't on the physical fight.

Gigantic arcs of power flew through the air, fighting, testing, straining. Lucifer was powerful, and his grace would have towered even over Castiel's. She could see why everyone had been scared. It would have been a very close thing, had she not been there.

But, of course, she was.

His power may have dwarfed another angel's, but Zoey's own energy matched Lucifer's. Blow for blow, blast for blast, they were even. Great, thundering clouds rolled across the sky, and were immediately banished. Huge strikes of lightning came from seemingly out of nowhere, and seemingly struck nothing. Giant, mile-long gauges opened up in the earth, and then closed again, as if someone was running an enormous zipper up and down along the ground.

And so they fought.

Zoey, Dean is opening the cage now.

She heard Castiel's voice in her head, and she sent back just an affirmative feeling. Her focus was on the fight, she didn't have time to even form words between Lucifer's fists and his power trying to punch through her own.

They both felt the atmosphere change when the cage opened. Heavenly power snuck out in tendrils from the door of the cage, unlike anything Zoey had ever felt.

Lucifer's eyes flashed, and Zoey saw fear there, and knew she would win.

Before she could make a move, however, Lucifer's eyes shifted. And almost before she could react, he had turned away from her.

Toward the Winchesters.

Toward Castiel.

"No!" she cried, and her power flared.

More than she ever had, in that moment, Zoey used all of her power. It was huge, encompassing, world-ending. She felt huge and mighty and strong. She knew in that instant that, should she want to, she could spin the globe on the tip of her finger like a child's basketball. She could end everything, if it struck her fancy.

Instead, she wrapped her demonic aura around the archangel, whose mistake had been assuming that Castiel made her weak, and picked Lucifer and his grace up into the air.

He fought, and it was just a bit of a struggle to hold onto him as she ran toward the opening of the cage. He was screaming incoherently, beating at her power, revealed once and for all as the tantrum-throwing child she had always suspected he was. "No! No, you stupid half-breed bitch! Let me out of here! No!"

She sensed her power slowly starting to drain. She had never used this much of it, it wasn't used to this level of energy. She could keep wards up and teleport all day, but the power was like a muscle. She had never used it at capacity, and so it was weakening. Lucifer sensed it, too. His struggles increased, his screaming ceased, and she felt her control slipping.

Lucky for her, she was at the edge of the cage.

Without a second thought, hesitation, or doubt, Zoey leaped down into Lucifer's cage, and used the last of her immense, awe-inspiring power, to yank the archangel back in with her. The cage slammed shut behind them, and she crowed in triumph, even as she was trapped forever with Lucifer.

xxxxx

The night before, she was lying on her stomach, savoring the way Castiel's big, cold hand was slowly running up and down her spine. It was relaxing and soothing, and it made her feel cherished.

For just a moment, Zoey wished she didn't have to fight Lucifer. That she had kept her big mouth shut, hidden her power, and would be able to stay here, with him.

She wanted to see how it ended, how heaven would deal with the aftermath. She wanted to protect and defend Castiel against his brothers and sisters, who Zoey could only assume wouldn't be terribly happy with him. She wanted to see Dean and Sam fight monsters, she wanted to help them, and then mock them when they messed up. While she fixed the mistake, of course.

She wanted to lie down for more than one night with her angel. She wanted to keep exploring every crease and muscle and ridge in his body, and let him explore hers. She wanted to fall in love with him.

For just a moment, on the night before she died, Zoey Crane wished she had more time.

xxxxx

Hi, beautiful readers! Here are my notes:
I own only Zoey Crane, the original character. I don't own Supernatural or any of the characters. (heartbroken)
Reviews, comments, and kudos give me life and keep me going.
And, as always, thank you for reading, you beautiful, beautiful people.
**The end... Or is it?