09x19 - Inject the Venom - Part Five: No Mercy
Episode number: 09x19 of Season 9 Fan Fiction (S9FF)
Title: Inject the Venom
Subtitle: No Mercy
Author: dracox-serdriel
Word Count: 3,111
Rating: R
Warnings: language, violence
Anna Kirchstein was a tall woman with a dark complexion, warm eyes, and a stunning disposition. Her house seemed to be white picket fence until she led them down to the basement. All Dean could think was that this woman put Bela Talbot to shame.
"You're on our side, right?" Sam asked, as if picking up on Dean's thoughts.
"I deal in occult objects. Mostly locking them away, but some of them are powerful protection artifacts," she said. "Admittedly I make a profit, which makes me a capitalist. Are you all right with that?"
Sam shrugged. "I guess."
Aaron spoke up, "Anna worked with my grandfather. I was worried she might be next."
"She wasn't on that list you gave us," Sam complained.
"No, I've touched base with her before, right after I met up with you two for the first time. We should be safe here, given the circumstances," Aaron replied.
"Great, maybe someone here can tell us what the hell is going on," Dean said mildly.
"A splinter group from the Thule Society, a faction if you will, has been targeting people who opposed the Thule. Trying to win their way back into the fold," Anna said.
"You sound certain," Dean said.
"After the attacks on Goren and Lizzy here, I became certain," she said. "I believe they're resurrecting members of their faction, using the bodies of their enemies."
"Why? They could just grab a stiff anywhere these days," Sam said.
"Not a stiff with fingerprints of someone who's testified against you, or who killed you," she said. "They don't just want to kill these people. There wanna destroy their legacy."
"Okay, I get that, but, there's gotta be a necromancer, right? At least one pulling the strings. So, who is it?" Dean asked. "We find him, waste him, then destroy the stones, that should put the spirits away, right?"
"Except, I don't know who it is. This faction, they call themselves the Pharaoh's Magicians because they stole their ideas and spells from the Ancient Egyptians. They were wiped out by the Thule a decade ago."
"The Thule? I thought - "
"They are a faction, a sect, originally they tried to take over, then break away," Anna said. "These men didn't care if you were white or blond or German. It made them unpopular to the Thule. The only guess I have is that someone decided to revive them."
"Aaron, be straight with us," Sam said. "How long has this been going on?"
Aaron swallowed. "I told you, about a week."
Sam's stare broke him.
"Okay, more like three months, but I didn't know. I didn't have the pieces to put together."
"Three months," Dean repeated. "Around the time those weird porcupine warriors started their shindig."
"Porcupines? What?" Aaron said.
"It doesn't matter," Anna interrupted. "They're regaining their ranks, destroying lives, and targeting people with special objects. Clearly they've got bigger plans, and we need to stop them."
"Couldn't agree with you more," Dean said. "But we've go the same problem: who is the necromancer?"
"We can't be sure," Aaron said, "But Liz had an idea."
"Ah, what's that?" Sam asked.
"They went after you two, not me or Adam. Right? So we figured, maybe, they were looking for the stones."
"Bait, I like it," Dean said.
"But they already tried to get it from you and failed," Liz said.
"Meaning?" Sam prompted.
"They'll be sending something else after us, and we don't know what," Aaron said lamely.
"Well, then I guess it's a good thing me and Sam are here," Dean said. "Because while we can't take down super undead ghosts, but we've got something for just about everything else."
Dodge and Kevin seemed terrible. They didn't eat. They didn't drink. Sleep was fevered and broken.
"I can try to - "
"No," they both said.
"You saved them," Cas said in comfort to Dodge. "Dean and Sam are safe."
"Something's wrong. They've gotten in the middle of a battle. And it's not the usual kind," Dodge said, fumbling with every word.
"What do you mean?" Cas asked.
"It's like - when our agents got in the crosshairs between two rival gangs. That's what it feels like to me."
Kevin emitted a little, "Huh."
Silence.
"I think I know what's going on," Kevin said. "Cas, you gotta go now, get them out of there. Right now."
"What?"
"Dodge is right, this isn't a battle between good and evil. This is a battle between one kind of evil and another. They're vying for power. And they don't care who they killed. Sam and Dean are stuck in a two-sided fight, and they're screwed."
"That's why the vision we both had made no sense!" Dodge said. "Because it's not about Sam or Dean at all."
Castiel closed his eyes and focused on Dean's GPS tracker. With a flick of his wings -
Nothing happened.
"Go!" Dodge said. "Go now!"
Cas focused. Dean was somewhere in Delaware, but he couldn't pinpoint him. He tried Sam. He, too, was somewhere in Delaware.
"I can't go to them."
"You mean because of the tagging on their ribs?" Dodge asked. "I thought you had a way around that?"
"I do, but I can't teleport to them. I - I'm blocked. I can't even tell you where they are."
Dodge scrambled for the phone.
"Cas," Kevin said. "If you can't get there, what about someone else?"
"Another angel?" he asked. "No - "
"Anyone else? Anyone who wouldn't kill them - "
"I - ", Cas stumbled with panicking picking up, "I don't know - "
Sam spoke into his phone, "I'll call you back." He hung up. "That was Dodge."
"Yeah? She see something?" Dean asked.
"She said Cas can't teleport to us. Something is blocking him."
Dean laughed. "That can't be right. The last thing that had the mojo to stop Cas it was - "
"Eve," Sam completed his sentence.
"Eve?" Lizzy said. "Who's she?"
"She's the one who created werewolves, vampires, that kind of thing," Dean said casually. "And we shoved her ass back into Purgatory three years ago. She's gone."
"Yeah, but something as powerful as she is in this area."
"Then we gank it," Dean dismissed.
"Dodge said this is warzone," Sam said to Anna and Elizabeth, "and we're just gonna be collateral damange. Wanna tell me what that means?"
"I don't know," Elizabeth said. When Sam's facial expression made it clear he didn't believe her, she added, "The man I loved just died. Okay? I've told you everything I know."
Anna added, "A necromancer can scramble signals - "
"Castiel is an angel," Dean said. "You know of a necromancer who can disturb that?"
"No," Anna said.
"It doesn't matter," the golem said. "I can sense them approaching."
"Them? Them who? Undead?"
"No," Adam replied. "But I think the necromancer is among them."
"We need to ditch this plan," Dean said. "Anna, take Liz here and use some major protective object in your car, and run. Aaron, you and Adam get ready to make a break for it."
"What about you two?" Aaron asked. "I'm not abandoning you."
"We're gonna target the necromancer. Whatever else he's got with him, he can still be killed," Sam replied. "And then we burn his body."
Elizabeth and Anna didn't need any more convincing. Anna's car roared away from the backwoods field.
Neumann spotted one car zooming away, but he couldn't stick a tracking spell on it. Whoever they were, he'd get to them eventually. The golem, its master, and the two annoyingly proficient agents remained out in the open. He had to focus his efforts on them.
"Go ahead," he said to his co-captain. "Send in your forces, Vidar."
Vidar smiled. He signaled to his crew silently, and they moved in. "You and I," Vidar said, "should wait a few minutes before moving in. Lovely view up here."
Dean and Sam stood in trine with Adam the golem. Aaron stood in the middle of them, unsure of what to do. Each Winchester loaded up a shotgun.
The first wave came streaking out of nowhere, as if they popped up from the ground. Bang! Pop! The Winchesters made their shots count, but by the teeth, they were up against vampires -
"Decapitation!" Sam shouted. "That's the only way."
Dean had no trouble with his machete, and Adam didn't need one, his bare hands were enough. Sam, on the other hand, went down and was forced to slash and cut to get to his opponent's head.
"I don't like this," Dean said. "Since when do monsters hang out with Nazi necromancer asshats?"
Another wave of vampires. Aaron made a good shot with a gun, but he'd never been in this line of danger before. "I need a knife," he said weakly. "If I'm gonna survive this one."
Sam handed off a long hunting knife.
"I see him," Dean said, pointing up to the edge of the hill. "That's gotta be him. He's signaling."
"It is," the golem said.
"Give me the stones," Aaron said. "Then take him down, Adam. Whatever it takes. Burn his body."
"Woah, wait, you said - " Sam said.
Aaron cut him off, "I know." Then he said to Adam, "Give me the stones."
Adam didn't question it; he handed off the stones and left.
The second wave attacked. Aaron wasn't very good with a knife, but he did surprisingly well avoiding the assault and providing cover fire.
"Six vampires," Dean said as he decapitated another. "This is so not good. Dodge mention anything specific?"
"She said we were in some kind of warzone," Sam replied, backing up to touch sides with Dean and Aaron. "Forces vying for power. That kind of thing."
"Fantastic," Dean said. "Just like old times"
"You did this before?" Aaron asked.
"Only during the Apocalypse," Sam said. "Don't worry, we averted it."
"I think that makes me feel better," Aaron said, shakily grabbing at his gun.
The screams from the hilltop drew Dean's attention. "Looks like Adam's got your necromancer," he said.
They all relaxed. "We'll find a way to destroy the stones. My grandfather wrote about them," Aaron said. "Thank you for saving my life, again."
"Don't thank us just yet," Sam said.
Neumann's neck snapped under the golem's hands. As per instruction, Adam took whatever the man had on him and lit his remains on fire. He turned back and saw just how bad the situation was.
Across the field, easily a dozen individuals collected behind one man. Maybe the necromancer was just some kind of bait or a culling tactic, and his rabbi was out in the open, completely vulnerable.
"RUN!" Adam bellowed. "RUN!"
The golem ran down to them, but even his feet couldn't fly.
"Crap, crap, crap!" Dean said, seeing the running golem. "He must see something we don't."
"That," Aaron said, pointing out the small cluster of someones rushing toward them in formation.
"Aaron, get down," Sam said, "behind that rock."
"No, I told you - "
"You're a good shot," Sam said, handing off their shotguns. "Make your hits count, and don't hit us. You're gonna cover us, you understand?"
"Yeah," he replied. "I've never done this before."
"Awesome," Dean said, taking out his handgun. "Think they're all vamps?"
"We're gonna find out."
Bang! Aaron took a shot at one of them; its head exploded.
"Ho-now! Awesome shot."
Aaron clearly didn't agree, but he swallowed hard and aimed for another. Bang! This one took the hit in the shoulder and went down.
Bang! Pop! Pop! Bang! The Winchesters fired at the onslaught, but it wasn't any use. They dropped only two more before they were in range, and each one of them was vamped out and carrying a machete.
Sam had better luck with his long knives this time, but even he couldn't deal with three vampires at once. Adam joined the fray, finally, just as Dean was knocked on his ass, bleeding rivers from his right leg.
Aaron kept it together. Pop! Another head came off. He wanted to vomit, but he couldn't - he had to keep shooting. Bang! Bang! Bang!
That last shot got something's attention; it came straight for him, and Adam intervened only in time to spray Aaron with blood.
"It's no use," Vidar announced from afar. "You're mortal, like my old friend there. I'll call a hundred more if I must. You ought to stop now. You can join me."
Dean wanted to cut that guy's head off, but he could barely move. The six remaining vampires regrouped; Adam and Sam couldn't hold off a half dozen of them. They closed in -
Fire and ash filled the air, and a young woman erupted into the field. She palmed two of the vampire's faces, and again fire and ash were everywhere. Their two bodies dropped, completely unblemished and unconscious.
Crack-snap! Sam decapitated one, and Adam dropped a fourth. Kuravi unceremoniously finished the last two, who fell to the ground next to their brethren.
"Who are you?" she said shortly to Aaron and the golem.
"They're with us," Dean said begrudgingly. "What the hell are you doing here?"
Vidar's scream filled the air, drawing their attention. Someone stood next to him with a hand over his head, and his eyes slowly burnt out, then flame churned up. Two lackeys flanked the man (or maybe the angel, Dean and Sam couldn't be sure). Even from a distance, their black eyes were evident.
"What the hell?" Sam said. "Demons?"
"Let's not find out," Kuravi commented mildly. "Come here," she said, grabbing at all four of them."
Ash, fire, and heat. They were gone.
Aaron remained shell shocked. They followed him and his golem out to the western edge of Kentucky, suffering Kuravi for the car ride because Castiel had insisted on it.
They saw Aaron off.
"You didn't kill anyone," Dean said. "No one human, okay? You did the right thing."
"Yeah, I know, but - I know this is a war, I just didn't know what kind of war. I never thought I'd have to shoot or anything."
"It was my error," Adam said. "I am to protect you. You should never have had to hurt anyone."
"You were following orders," Aaron replied. "So the error was mine."
The Winchesters were impressed by how far the young man had come. "You might be on someone else's radar," Sam said. "So maybe keep a low profile for a few weeks?"
"And call us if something like this comes up," Dean said. "Men of Letters and the Judah Initiative are allies, don't forget it."
"I won't," Aaron replied before returning to his car.
Kuravi remained in the back seat of the Impala.
"You know what, we're good," Dean said. "We're fine."
"I can see that," she said. "But the fact remains that demons, plural, are back on earth and working with an angel more powerful than Castiel."
Dean bit his lip. "You think it's Lucifer?" he asked.
"Dunno," she admitted. "But he was cleaning something up. Witches often draw power from demons."
"I thought necromancers worked with dead people," Sam said. "Do they need demons?"
Kuravi shrugged. "Maybe that's why the demons are killing them. No living witches that exist beyond demonic control? The next generation of witches would have to rely on Hell for power."
"You seem to be in the know," Sam said mildly.
"Vampires were working with a sorcerer," she said. "That's unusually. Demons and even witches don't normally ally themselves with monsters like that. They don't have to."
Sam fumbled a bit. "So, where do you stand in all of this?" he asked. "Are you on our side?"
Kuravi blinked. "I'm a pacifist. I don't fight. When it comes to war, I am on no one's side."
"You pulled us out of the fire," Dean said.
"Castiel asked me to," she replied curtly.
"You seemed okay with violence back there," Sam said.
"I used no violence."
"Really? You didn't roast up any vampires?" Dean asked. "'Cause that's what it looked like."
"Did it? Is that why their bodies were unmarked?" she asked. "I didn't kill them. I healed them."
"Uh, sorry, what?" Sam asked.
"I returned them to humanity. Those four are no longer vampires," she replied.
"No way," Dean said. "No one can do that."
"I am the antithesis of monsters in a very literal sense. If anyone can heal monstrosity, it's me."
"So, what, something you can't heal attacks you, you do nothing?" Dean asked. "What kind of sense does that make?"
Kuravi huffed, "I can always run."
"Why? You must be able to destroy monsters just as much as heal them. If you are their opposite, don't you want to kill them?" Sam asked.
She shook her head. "I am a pacifist."
"So what? God made you a pacifist, and that's it?"
"No, I was made like you. Neutral. I was given a choice, just like the Leviathan. I could be their adversary, their opponent, and make it the goal of my existence to wipe out their race - "
"Sounds good," Dean commented.
"Or I could decide that I was something better. Someone who stops violence. Someone who heals. So I made that choice. It's who I am."
"How's that been working out for you? Weren't you locked away for eons?" Dean asked. "You can't tell me being a pacifist is the answer."
"You are mortal," she replied. "Your lives are finite. If I had made my life into nothing more than killing all the Leviathan, what would I do when they were all dead? Immortals can't define themselves by their enemies. Not if they wish to survive them," Kuravi replied.
"I can understand that," Sam said, "but you must have been in situations where you've lost someone because you didn't fight. Haven't you?"
"Tell me that you have lost no one from your lives because you are warriors. Tell me you never have left anyone behind to protect their lives while you continue on your mission," Kuravi said, sharp and keen. When neither brother replied, she added, "I have lost much, but so have you. Being a warrior, it appears, is not 'the answer' either. Maybe there is no answer at all."
Dean didn't like the image she was reflecting back at him. "I guess not," he said. "Like you said, we're mortal. We don't mind being small like you said."
"I never said you were small," she replied. Fire and ash - she was gone.
"Great, Dean, why not piss off all our allies?" Sam spat.
"Allies? That bitch had us release who-knows-what from the bowels of the earth. Don't think I've forgotten that."
"Come on, we'd better get home."
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09x20 Retrograde Opposition
(coming soon...)
Primary Post: 09x19 Inject the Venom
Primary Post: Season 9 Fan Fiction (S9FF)
Title: Inject the Venom
Subtitle: No Mercy
Author: dracox-serdriel
Word Count: 3,111
Rating: R
Warnings: language, violence
Anna Kirchstein was a tall woman with a dark complexion, warm eyes, and a stunning disposition. Her house seemed to be white picket fence until she led them down to the basement. All Dean could think was that this woman put Bela Talbot to shame.
"You're on our side, right?" Sam asked, as if picking up on Dean's thoughts.
"I deal in occult objects. Mostly locking them away, but some of them are powerful protection artifacts," she said. "Admittedly I make a profit, which makes me a capitalist. Are you all right with that?"
Sam shrugged. "I guess."
Aaron spoke up, "Anna worked with my grandfather. I was worried she might be next."
"She wasn't on that list you gave us," Sam complained.
"No, I've touched base with her before, right after I met up with you two for the first time. We should be safe here, given the circumstances," Aaron replied.
"Great, maybe someone here can tell us what the hell is going on," Dean said mildly.
"A splinter group from the Thule Society, a faction if you will, has been targeting people who opposed the Thule. Trying to win their way back into the fold," Anna said.
"You sound certain," Dean said.
"After the attacks on Goren and Lizzy here, I became certain," she said. "I believe they're resurrecting members of their faction, using the bodies of their enemies."
"Why? They could just grab a stiff anywhere these days," Sam said.
"Not a stiff with fingerprints of someone who's testified against you, or who killed you," she said. "They don't just want to kill these people. There wanna destroy their legacy."
"Okay, I get that, but, there's gotta be a necromancer, right? At least one pulling the strings. So, who is it?" Dean asked. "We find him, waste him, then destroy the stones, that should put the spirits away, right?"
"Except, I don't know who it is. This faction, they call themselves the Pharaoh's Magicians because they stole their ideas and spells from the Ancient Egyptians. They were wiped out by the Thule a decade ago."
"The Thule? I thought - "
"They are a faction, a sect, originally they tried to take over, then break away," Anna said. "These men didn't care if you were white or blond or German. It made them unpopular to the Thule. The only guess I have is that someone decided to revive them."
"Aaron, be straight with us," Sam said. "How long has this been going on?"
Aaron swallowed. "I told you, about a week."
Sam's stare broke him.
"Okay, more like three months, but I didn't know. I didn't have the pieces to put together."
"Three months," Dean repeated. "Around the time those weird porcupine warriors started their shindig."
"Porcupines? What?" Aaron said.
"It doesn't matter," Anna interrupted. "They're regaining their ranks, destroying lives, and targeting people with special objects. Clearly they've got bigger plans, and we need to stop them."
"Couldn't agree with you more," Dean said. "But we've go the same problem: who is the necromancer?"
"We can't be sure," Aaron said, "But Liz had an idea."
"Ah, what's that?" Sam asked.
"They went after you two, not me or Adam. Right? So we figured, maybe, they were looking for the stones."
"Bait, I like it," Dean said.
"But they already tried to get it from you and failed," Liz said.
"Meaning?" Sam prompted.
"They'll be sending something else after us, and we don't know what," Aaron said lamely.
"Well, then I guess it's a good thing me and Sam are here," Dean said. "Because while we can't take down super undead ghosts, but we've got something for just about everything else."
Dodge and Kevin seemed terrible. They didn't eat. They didn't drink. Sleep was fevered and broken.
"I can try to - "
"No," they both said.
"You saved them," Cas said in comfort to Dodge. "Dean and Sam are safe."
"Something's wrong. They've gotten in the middle of a battle. And it's not the usual kind," Dodge said, fumbling with every word.
"What do you mean?" Cas asked.
"It's like - when our agents got in the crosshairs between two rival gangs. That's what it feels like to me."
Kevin emitted a little, "Huh."
Silence.
"I think I know what's going on," Kevin said. "Cas, you gotta go now, get them out of there. Right now."
"What?"
"Dodge is right, this isn't a battle between good and evil. This is a battle between one kind of evil and another. They're vying for power. And they don't care who they killed. Sam and Dean are stuck in a two-sided fight, and they're screwed."
"That's why the vision we both had made no sense!" Dodge said. "Because it's not about Sam or Dean at all."
Castiel closed his eyes and focused on Dean's GPS tracker. With a flick of his wings -
Nothing happened.
"Go!" Dodge said. "Go now!"
Cas focused. Dean was somewhere in Delaware, but he couldn't pinpoint him. He tried Sam. He, too, was somewhere in Delaware.
"I can't go to them."
"You mean because of the tagging on their ribs?" Dodge asked. "I thought you had a way around that?"
"I do, but I can't teleport to them. I - I'm blocked. I can't even tell you where they are."
Dodge scrambled for the phone.
"Cas," Kevin said. "If you can't get there, what about someone else?"
"Another angel?" he asked. "No - "
"Anyone else? Anyone who wouldn't kill them - "
"I - ", Cas stumbled with panicking picking up, "I don't know - "
Sam spoke into his phone, "I'll call you back." He hung up. "That was Dodge."
"Yeah? She see something?" Dean asked.
"She said Cas can't teleport to us. Something is blocking him."
Dean laughed. "That can't be right. The last thing that had the mojo to stop Cas it was - "
"Eve," Sam completed his sentence.
"Eve?" Lizzy said. "Who's she?"
"She's the one who created werewolves, vampires, that kind of thing," Dean said casually. "And we shoved her ass back into Purgatory three years ago. She's gone."
"Yeah, but something as powerful as she is in this area."
"Then we gank it," Dean dismissed.
"Dodge said this is warzone," Sam said to Anna and Elizabeth, "and we're just gonna be collateral damange. Wanna tell me what that means?"
"I don't know," Elizabeth said. When Sam's facial expression made it clear he didn't believe her, she added, "The man I loved just died. Okay? I've told you everything I know."
Anna added, "A necromancer can scramble signals - "
"Castiel is an angel," Dean said. "You know of a necromancer who can disturb that?"
"No," Anna said.
"It doesn't matter," the golem said. "I can sense them approaching."
"Them? Them who? Undead?"
"No," Adam replied. "But I think the necromancer is among them."
"We need to ditch this plan," Dean said. "Anna, take Liz here and use some major protective object in your car, and run. Aaron, you and Adam get ready to make a break for it."
"What about you two?" Aaron asked. "I'm not abandoning you."
"We're gonna target the necromancer. Whatever else he's got with him, he can still be killed," Sam replied. "And then we burn his body."
Elizabeth and Anna didn't need any more convincing. Anna's car roared away from the backwoods field.
Neumann spotted one car zooming away, but he couldn't stick a tracking spell on it. Whoever they were, he'd get to them eventually. The golem, its master, and the two annoyingly proficient agents remained out in the open. He had to focus his efforts on them.
"Go ahead," he said to his co-captain. "Send in your forces, Vidar."
Vidar smiled. He signaled to his crew silently, and they moved in. "You and I," Vidar said, "should wait a few minutes before moving in. Lovely view up here."
Dean and Sam stood in trine with Adam the golem. Aaron stood in the middle of them, unsure of what to do. Each Winchester loaded up a shotgun.
The first wave came streaking out of nowhere, as if they popped up from the ground. Bang! Pop! The Winchesters made their shots count, but by the teeth, they were up against vampires -
"Decapitation!" Sam shouted. "That's the only way."
Dean had no trouble with his machete, and Adam didn't need one, his bare hands were enough. Sam, on the other hand, went down and was forced to slash and cut to get to his opponent's head.
"I don't like this," Dean said. "Since when do monsters hang out with Nazi necromancer asshats?"
Another wave of vampires. Aaron made a good shot with a gun, but he'd never been in this line of danger before. "I need a knife," he said weakly. "If I'm gonna survive this one."
Sam handed off a long hunting knife.
"I see him," Dean said, pointing up to the edge of the hill. "That's gotta be him. He's signaling."
"It is," the golem said.
"Give me the stones," Aaron said. "Then take him down, Adam. Whatever it takes. Burn his body."
"Woah, wait, you said - " Sam said.
Aaron cut him off, "I know." Then he said to Adam, "Give me the stones."
Adam didn't question it; he handed off the stones and left.
The second wave attacked. Aaron wasn't very good with a knife, but he did surprisingly well avoiding the assault and providing cover fire.
"Six vampires," Dean said as he decapitated another. "This is so not good. Dodge mention anything specific?"
"She said we were in some kind of warzone," Sam replied, backing up to touch sides with Dean and Aaron. "Forces vying for power. That kind of thing."
"Fantastic," Dean said. "Just like old times"
"You did this before?" Aaron asked.
"Only during the Apocalypse," Sam said. "Don't worry, we averted it."
"I think that makes me feel better," Aaron said, shakily grabbing at his gun.
The screams from the hilltop drew Dean's attention. "Looks like Adam's got your necromancer," he said.
They all relaxed. "We'll find a way to destroy the stones. My grandfather wrote about them," Aaron said. "Thank you for saving my life, again."
"Don't thank us just yet," Sam said.
Neumann's neck snapped under the golem's hands. As per instruction, Adam took whatever the man had on him and lit his remains on fire. He turned back and saw just how bad the situation was.
Across the field, easily a dozen individuals collected behind one man. Maybe the necromancer was just some kind of bait or a culling tactic, and his rabbi was out in the open, completely vulnerable.
"RUN!" Adam bellowed. "RUN!"
The golem ran down to them, but even his feet couldn't fly.
"Crap, crap, crap!" Dean said, seeing the running golem. "He must see something we don't."
"That," Aaron said, pointing out the small cluster of someones rushing toward them in formation.
"Aaron, get down," Sam said, "behind that rock."
"No, I told you - "
"You're a good shot," Sam said, handing off their shotguns. "Make your hits count, and don't hit us. You're gonna cover us, you understand?"
"Yeah," he replied. "I've never done this before."
"Awesome," Dean said, taking out his handgun. "Think they're all vamps?"
"We're gonna find out."
Bang! Aaron took a shot at one of them; its head exploded.
"Ho-now! Awesome shot."
Aaron clearly didn't agree, but he swallowed hard and aimed for another. Bang! This one took the hit in the shoulder and went down.
Bang! Pop! Pop! Bang! The Winchesters fired at the onslaught, but it wasn't any use. They dropped only two more before they were in range, and each one of them was vamped out and carrying a machete.
Sam had better luck with his long knives this time, but even he couldn't deal with three vampires at once. Adam joined the fray, finally, just as Dean was knocked on his ass, bleeding rivers from his right leg.
Aaron kept it together. Pop! Another head came off. He wanted to vomit, but he couldn't - he had to keep shooting. Bang! Bang! Bang!
That last shot got something's attention; it came straight for him, and Adam intervened only in time to spray Aaron with blood.
"It's no use," Vidar announced from afar. "You're mortal, like my old friend there. I'll call a hundred more if I must. You ought to stop now. You can join me."
Dean wanted to cut that guy's head off, but he could barely move. The six remaining vampires regrouped; Adam and Sam couldn't hold off a half dozen of them. They closed in -
Fire and ash filled the air, and a young woman erupted into the field. She palmed two of the vampire's faces, and again fire and ash were everywhere. Their two bodies dropped, completely unblemished and unconscious.
Crack-snap! Sam decapitated one, and Adam dropped a fourth. Kuravi unceremoniously finished the last two, who fell to the ground next to their brethren.
"Who are you?" she said shortly to Aaron and the golem.
"They're with us," Dean said begrudgingly. "What the hell are you doing here?"
Vidar's scream filled the air, drawing their attention. Someone stood next to him with a hand over his head, and his eyes slowly burnt out, then flame churned up. Two lackeys flanked the man (or maybe the angel, Dean and Sam couldn't be sure). Even from a distance, their black eyes were evident.
"What the hell?" Sam said. "Demons?"
"Let's not find out," Kuravi commented mildly. "Come here," she said, grabbing at all four of them."
Ash, fire, and heat. They were gone.
Aaron remained shell shocked. They followed him and his golem out to the western edge of Kentucky, suffering Kuravi for the car ride because Castiel had insisted on it.
They saw Aaron off.
"You didn't kill anyone," Dean said. "No one human, okay? You did the right thing."
"Yeah, I know, but - I know this is a war, I just didn't know what kind of war. I never thought I'd have to shoot or anything."
"It was my error," Adam said. "I am to protect you. You should never have had to hurt anyone."
"You were following orders," Aaron replied. "So the error was mine."
The Winchesters were impressed by how far the young man had come. "You might be on someone else's radar," Sam said. "So maybe keep a low profile for a few weeks?"
"And call us if something like this comes up," Dean said. "Men of Letters and the Judah Initiative are allies, don't forget it."
"I won't," Aaron replied before returning to his car.
Kuravi remained in the back seat of the Impala.
"You know what, we're good," Dean said. "We're fine."
"I can see that," she said. "But the fact remains that demons, plural, are back on earth and working with an angel more powerful than Castiel."
Dean bit his lip. "You think it's Lucifer?" he asked.
"Dunno," she admitted. "But he was cleaning something up. Witches often draw power from demons."
"I thought necromancers worked with dead people," Sam said. "Do they need demons?"
Kuravi shrugged. "Maybe that's why the demons are killing them. No living witches that exist beyond demonic control? The next generation of witches would have to rely on Hell for power."
"You seem to be in the know," Sam said mildly.
"Vampires were working with a sorcerer," she said. "That's unusually. Demons and even witches don't normally ally themselves with monsters like that. They don't have to."
Sam fumbled a bit. "So, where do you stand in all of this?" he asked. "Are you on our side?"
Kuravi blinked. "I'm a pacifist. I don't fight. When it comes to war, I am on no one's side."
"You pulled us out of the fire," Dean said.
"Castiel asked me to," she replied curtly.
"You seemed okay with violence back there," Sam said.
"I used no violence."
"Really? You didn't roast up any vampires?" Dean asked. "'Cause that's what it looked like."
"Did it? Is that why their bodies were unmarked?" she asked. "I didn't kill them. I healed them."
"Uh, sorry, what?" Sam asked.
"I returned them to humanity. Those four are no longer vampires," she replied.
"No way," Dean said. "No one can do that."
"I am the antithesis of monsters in a very literal sense. If anyone can heal monstrosity, it's me."
"So, what, something you can't heal attacks you, you do nothing?" Dean asked. "What kind of sense does that make?"
Kuravi huffed, "I can always run."
"Why? You must be able to destroy monsters just as much as heal them. If you are their opposite, don't you want to kill them?" Sam asked.
She shook her head. "I am a pacifist."
"So what? God made you a pacifist, and that's it?"
"No, I was made like you. Neutral. I was given a choice, just like the Leviathan. I could be their adversary, their opponent, and make it the goal of my existence to wipe out their race - "
"Sounds good," Dean commented.
"Or I could decide that I was something better. Someone who stops violence. Someone who heals. So I made that choice. It's who I am."
"How's that been working out for you? Weren't you locked away for eons?" Dean asked. "You can't tell me being a pacifist is the answer."
"You are mortal," she replied. "Your lives are finite. If I had made my life into nothing more than killing all the Leviathan, what would I do when they were all dead? Immortals can't define themselves by their enemies. Not if they wish to survive them," Kuravi replied.
"I can understand that," Sam said, "but you must have been in situations where you've lost someone because you didn't fight. Haven't you?"
"Tell me that you have lost no one from your lives because you are warriors. Tell me you never have left anyone behind to protect their lives while you continue on your mission," Kuravi said, sharp and keen. When neither brother replied, she added, "I have lost much, but so have you. Being a warrior, it appears, is not 'the answer' either. Maybe there is no answer at all."
Dean didn't like the image she was reflecting back at him. "I guess not," he said. "Like you said, we're mortal. We don't mind being small like you said."
"I never said you were small," she replied. Fire and ash - she was gone.
"Great, Dean, why not piss off all our allies?" Sam spat.
"Allies? That bitch had us release who-knows-what from the bowels of the earth. Don't think I've forgotten that."
"Come on, we'd better get home."
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09x20 Retrograde Opposition
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Primary Post: 09x19 Inject the Venom
Primary Post: Season 9 Fan Fiction (S9FF)