Supernatural fic: City of Lost Things 2a/3 (R, gen)
Title: City of Lost Things 2/3
Author: Krisomniac
Rating, Warning, pairing: R, two very tasty brothers, gen
Disclaimer: Not mine. No profit or copyright infringement intended.
Author's Note: Many thanks to ignipes and amchara, without your help, I never would've gotten this one right. Second (although I'm splitting it into two entries) of a three-part story. More coming soon.
Summary: Sam has visions. Dean drives in New York. Demons ride subways, and hell is an office building on Fifth. (this part ~4000 words)
part one
City of Lost Things
Part Two: Enemies in Friends
1.
~
"We're here to see Miss Gregory, Shultz Advertising."
The security guard skims through the list on his computer screen. He's got the lazy, bored and vaguely threatening look of a Rottweiler lying in the sun, half-chewed bone in its jaws. "What'd you say your names were, again?"
"Eric Bloom and Andrew Winters." Sam can hear the impatient edge in Dean's voice, an edge that has grown sharper with each checkpoint they're sent to. Dean scratches around the collar of his dress shirt before continuing. "We're from Blue Oyster Packaging."
"Hey." The security guard looks at them, trying to figure them out like a man in the shower fumbling for a very slippery bar of soap. "Your names, aren't they the--"
"We get that all the time." There's such finality to Dean's words that the guard doesn’t question them further.
They've already had their bags searched and licenses examined twice. Sam figures they're lucky that no one was there to take their fingerprints or DNA. He idly looks over the heads of the people-- businessmen to sandwich delivery boys-- with valid IDs, swiping in and out of the elevators.
And freezes.
Wordlessly, he grabs Dean's arm.
Under his breath, Dean hisses, "What?"
It's Sessions. Sam recognized him immediately. The way he carries himself, as though there's no one else in the room, the suit that's just a little more pressed and polished than any one else's, with the same hair and cold eyes as he saw in his dream last night. Sam watches Sessions pass through the checkpoints unhindered and enter an elevator.
"It's him," he whispers to Dean.
Dean tenses, ready to bolt up the stairs, only falling still when Sam rests a hand on his shoulder. Sam drums his fingers on the desk until the guard hands him a heavy pass with bar code to get in and out of the building. They turn to leave.
"One moment, mister… Not you. You."
Dean rolls his eyes and whispers to Sam to be careful. His smile is wide, bright and utterly fake as he turns back to the lobby.
By the time he gets to the elevators, Sam is sure he's already too late. Pressing the button for fifty-seven, he feels a familiar creeping tension snaking its way up his neck and around the base of his skull. No matter how hard he tries, he can't control it, can't make it stop.
Not now. Not now.
Sagging against the wall, he presses the button again and takes a deep breath.
~
Shannon glances at the clock. It fills the silence with a soft ticking that counts down the seconds until--
"Miss Gregory, Mr. Sessions here to see you."
She exhales, and this time Sam is looking for the flash of green from her eyes. "Send him in."
Bright, blinding sunlight fills the room, arcing like lightning into Sam's mind before it swirls into a dizzying ocean of blue. And when it clears, she's sprawled on the rooftop below.
Blood trickles from the corner of her mouth, redder than the sun in her hair. She sits up and stares at Sam.
"Help me," she says this time, and in her face he sees only a lost and broken girl. "You have to stop him."
~
Sam feels the elevator slow. A wave of motion sickness breaks over him--whether from the rapid ascent or memory of the fall, he's not sure. The hand rail digs into his back, and he pushes himself up as the bell rings discreetly. Sam blinks away the pain in his head, orienting himself. Dean is still downstairs; he's all alone.
The light behind the button labeled fifty-seven blinks off. Sam clenches his teeth and hopes he's not too late.
The doors to the elevator open on the brightly-lit and fashionably-decorated offices of Schultz Advertising. At the same moment, the doors one car over gently close.
Sessions is gone.
In a daze, Sam approaches the perky secretary outside Miss Gregory's office.
"Are you here to see Miss Gregory?"
He nods and continues on.
"One moment. I'll ring her-- hey, wait! You can't just go in there!"
He barely registers her protests as he walks into the empty office. The window is open and a wintry breeze blows papers off their neat stacks on the desk, scattering them like dead leaves on the floor.
The secretary closes the window, shivering. "I'm sorry-- I don't know where she-- must've left while I wasn't looking. Why don't you have a seat and I'll just go find her. Have a seat while you wait. I know she won't want to miss you." She nervously points to a plush leather chair with carved lion heads on the arms. Then she slips out of the room and shuts the door quietly behind her.
Sam doesn't trust his own voice, doesn't look out the window. Dizzy and weak, he sinks into the empty chair and rests his head in his hands.
Less than a minute passes, or maybe it's five, before the door opens again. Dean slides to a stop in front of him. "Sorry, man. I don't know why security never trusts my good intentions… Sam?"
"Yeah." He doesn't even bother to mention that Dean's problem with security probably stems from the fact that he needs a concealed weapons license just to get dressed in the morning.
"You okay?"
"We're too late."
Dean walks over to the window, opens it, and leans out. "Ugh. Have you--"
"I've seen it."
"Well, if your visions were right, she's not really dead."
"She asked me to help. I couldn't."
"We--"
"Got here too late. Don't even know how to find Sessions." He pauses, remembering the look on her face, so young… "And she looks awfully dead from up here."
"Hey," Dean takes his shoulders. "We'll figure this out, but we've got to get to her first. How many flights down is she?" He walks back to the window, gauging the distance. "You think I can make it?"
"Don't be an idiot," Sam says, "Last time I checked, you still couldn't fly. We can get to that roof from the inside."
Dean flashes a quick, knowing smile, and they leave the offices of Schultz Advertising through the front door.
~
"Why, exactly, do we have to walk up?" Dean huffs. He's already pulled off his tie and opened the first few buttons of his shirt.
"No security cameras," Sam explains again. "Unless you want them confiscating your things."
Ahead of him, Dean's hand closes reflexively on the gun tucked in his waistband and he pats the book of exorcisms tucked into his jacket.
"Plus, I thought you could use the exercise, pudgy."
For a moment, he thinks Dean is going to tackle him down the stairs, but instead he rolls his eyes, deciding to save his energy for the next eight flights up.
They burst through the door to the roof, both gasping for breath and looking to either side for the body.
"Here," Dean yells. "Over here."
Sam skids to a stop beside him. It's Shannon and up close, the damage is worse. Her ribcage looks deflated, caved in on one side. The heel of one shoe is broken, and her elbows protrude at angles Sam never wants to see again. She's no longer bleeding, her heart having long ago stopped, but there are dry splatters all around the body. It smells faintly of iron and meat left too long in the sun.
The strange thing, the thing Sam never felt in his visions, is that she's throwing off heat. It surrounds them and seems to quiet the wind. He can see it rising off her body in waves.
"What do we--"
Sam's question is cut short as Shannon gasps once, twice, and opens her eyes. One by one, she begins to sort out her limbs, straightening her arms and legs and lastly, her hair. She arches her back and sits up, rolls her neck slowly and wipes the blood from her lips. Coughing quietly while her ribcage expands, she stands, examines her broken heel, and looks up at Sam and Dean.
"Oh, don’t worry," she says with a wave of her hand. "I've got a change of clothes in my office." She scratches at the stains on her white silk blouse. "The dry cleaner is going to have a hell of a time getting these out." Raising one eyebrow, she adds, "You couldn't have gotten here before they dried, boys?"
Dean had pulled the ancient rites from his pocket the moment she began to move, and he's standing to the side now, whispering words of an exorcism Sam can't quite make out.
Sam walks forward. "What just happened? How did you survive?"
"And they told me you were the smart one." She licks her lips, meeting his gaze. "What happened is that I called and you came. As for how I survived--"
Her eyes fire green as Sam feels Dean's hand on his arm, grip tight, pulling him away from the demon girl.
"Just ask your brother."
"Exert tua virtute et fortitudinem levi sue benedectis," Dean says, book open his hand, Dad's old rosary beads twined around his fingers. It's the end of the ritual. "One more word." He grins cruelly. "Give me one good reason not to send you back to hell."
Shannon remains perfectly calm. "Just one?" She smiles, snake-like. "How's this? I know what you're hunting, who you're hunting. I know it's too big for the two of you to take on alone. You need my help." She studies each of them for a reaction. Dean's face is a blank mask; she steps toward him.
"I also know where your father is, Dean. I can take you to him."
He hasn't moved, but meets her gaze with silent fury.
"And in case you've forgotten--" She's standing inches from Dean, her hand on his chest, iridescent eyes staring up at him. "There's Shannon to consider."
"Trapped inside her own body," he says, voice low and livid. "Who do you think-- I'm doing this for Shannon."
"Really?" Her breath catches in her throat and she sags against his chest, crumpled and close like a child. The air around them chills, wind whipping at their clothing and hair, and the everyday sounds of the city drift up from the street below. For a moment no one moves, then Shannon breathes again. She backs a step away from Dean. Sam wonders what's happened to make her look so different, afraid.
"You're not doing this for me," she says.
It's her eyes. They're just… human.
"Close the book, Dean… please?" She looks so sad; Dean doesn't move. "That is your name, right, Dean? I'm Shannon."
He grunts his assent.
She reaches up and touches the bruise on his cheek. "I'm sorry about yesterday." Steps back awkwardly on the broken heel. "But I can't let you finish. You do understand?"
"No." Sam breaks the silence. "You're a demon. Of course you don't want us to--"
"I am not a demon. She's here, inside me, but I'm not her." Shannon explains herself patiently, as though to a child. "I'm just a woman. Sam? I've seen you, in your dreams. You know this is me."
"Right," Dean snorts. "Because demons never lie."
"Think," she says, voice insistent. "Is this like any exorcism you've seen before?"
"Well." He considers. "It's not so much with the head spinning or pea soup, but that doesn't mean--"
"It means everything, Dean. You've never exorcised a willing victim, and you're working alone here. I'm not going to help you send her back to hell."
"I don't understand." Dean blinks, teeth clenched. "You-- you want this? To be possessed?"
"I can explain." She raises her rust-stained shirt and runs her fingers over a softly curved waist and stomach. "It was a hunter," she tells them. "Like you."
Dean stares at the pale, unblemished skin. "I don't see anything," he says, then grins. "Well, that's not entirely true--"
"I was walking home from a party downtown." She lets the shirt fall. "A man was being chased down an alley across the street. I don't know what he had done, but his eyes were strange, and I pressed myself against the building, praying he wouldn't see me. I was so scared. I've never been so scared." She looks afraid, just recalling it. "The demon inside him saw, of course, and the moment before he crumpled into a heap at my feet, she knew how frightened I was. The hunter was only a few steps behind."
"Oh." Sam thinks he understands. "He killed you," he says quietly.
"Sixteen bullets. Consecrated iron." She pauses, skating her hands over the fabric as though remembering each one as it entered her body. "He didn't know what he was hunting, or that the bullets wouldn't harm it. All he saw was that the thing he'd been chasing was inside of me. Desperate to destroy her, he didn't care who else died. He was a killer, but the demon saved me that night. And she has given me life every day since."
Shannon meets each of their eyes. "It may not be the kind of life you're used to, but it's mine and I don't want to die."
Silence descends again.
"That is the stupidest--" Dean pulls out the book and the beads, and he takes control of the situation again. Sam recognizes the dangerous gleam in his eye. "Did you ever once stop to consider the danger you were in, that you put everyone around you in? You can't control it. No one can." He steps up, towering over her. "It can kill, whatever, whenever." Then he adds, eyes narrowing suspiciously, "What happened to that hunter, anyway?"
"No worse than he deserved." Shannon doesn't back down.
"You killed him. Or the demon killed him. It's all the same." He tosses the book and beads to Sam, pulls a vial of holy water from his pocket. "Sam, start. All they want is death and destruct--"
"Wait!" Her shout is piercing in its desperation, and Dean pauses mid-sentence. Sam continues to whisper the words of the exorcism.
"You still don't understand. She can help you. She knows the one you're fighting, and she wants hell on earth about as much as you do."
"She what?"
"She's trying to stop it but can't work alone any more than you can, than anyone can. His plans are too big. His spies are everywhere."
"You expect me to believe in good demons now?" Dean stops just short of laughing in her face.
"Not good, just one who happens to like things here, the way they are." She calms the moment they begin to listen. "Just imagine what would happen if a demon learned it's more fun to fuck a man than watch him bleed, that red wine tastes better than burnt ground. Possession works both ways, Dean. I know her. Better than anyone. Can't you even admit the possibility that maybe you're wrong?"
Sam pauses, Latin syllables hanging in the air. "Dean, maybe--"
"No, Sam. There is no exception to this rule."
"But what if there is?" Shannon's voice is soft, now, and full of promise. "I could've jumped off this roof anytime. I could've thrown you. But you're here for a reason. She called you. Stop the exorcism. Talk to her. Put those things away. Let us help you in good faith. Let us help you find your father. Then decide."
Dean clenches his jaw and looks at Sam, his face a mask of conflicted emotion, desperate and terrified to believe. Sam is only sure of one thing; he brought them here. Whether or not he wants it, it's his call.
With the heady feeling of someone standing at the edge of a cliff, he lowers his hands. "How long have you been possessed?" he asks.
"Four years."
"She said she brought me here."
"She did, but it's a very long story, and I only know a small part."
"We have all the time in the world." Dean's tone is low and angry, and he keeps the holy water poised.
"The demon you're hunting, the one who killed your mother, your girlfriend--" Shannon looks slowly from Dean to Sam, and her voice takes on a quiet, rhythmic quality. "The one who took your father in exchange for your life, who you've chased for a year now, she's been running from him for lifetimes. She commanded his legion at the dawn of time."
Dean snorts. "Right. And god made the world in seven days."
She looks at him sharply. "Whether or not it happened, doesn't make a story less true."
Sam prompts her, "Go on."
"After the war that split heaven and hell, she came to earth to cause sickness and death, to make storms that would raze the crops and lay villages to the ground. She killed men and possessed them, but she learned from them, too. Living here so long, eating with them, sharing their lives and their loves-- it changed her." Shannon pauses and licks her lips thoughtfully.
"One day, she abandoned her task and has been running from her liege ever since. She knows his ways; it's how she has remained hidden for so long. But the time for hiding is over. He grows strong, and she must-- I must-- go to hell to erase her name. I can't go alone and she can't come with me, so she called you to us. She led him to me knowing that if he sent his soldiers, you would see, and you would come. She knew you could help."
"Help you what?"
"Get to hell. In exchange, she will show you where your father is imprisoned."
"But," Sam protests, eyebrows knitted. "Why choose us?"
She raises an eyebrow. "Because you have a reasonable chance of getting in and out alive. Because the demon has something you want. Because she could. But most of all, because there isn't anyone else who can save me, or save your father."
Dad. Sam swallows around the knot in the back of his throat. His mouth is dry and he doesn't know how to respond. "You really believe this?"
She nods. "With all my heart." The wind whips around them, clear and cold.
"What's it like?" he finally asks.
Shannon smiles, the first genuine smile he's seen today, and it lights the heavy shadows under her eyes. "It's like-- you two share a car? Sometimes one drives, sometimes the other, but you're both agreed on the destination and never could travel any other way. On long road trips, when there's nothing but scrub trees outside the window and the radio reception is shit, when you have nothing to do but talk or sleep, you get to know each other, until you know your brother better than anyone else in the world."
Sam nods.
"So you understand the concept. Now imagine the car is your body, the road trip your life, and you'll have almost the tiniest glimpse of understanding what it's like." She closes her eyes and sighs. "It isn't a bad thing." She wraps her arms around herself, shivering in the wind. "It's cold here, and they'll wonder where I am. Come back to my office, and I'll answer all your questions there."
She walks over to the top of the stairs, where the door is still hanging open.
"And Dean," she says, turning, "in all the time I've been--as you call it--possessed, we've never killed a soul."
~
2.
~
"It's not possible," Dean finally says. He feels dazed-- as though his brain is stuffed with cotton and strong liquor-- and has been ever since they left the roof, his jacket draped over Shannon's shoulders to hide the blood on her clothes. He can't shake the feeling that they're walking willingly into a trap, but he can't figure out how it's going to spring.
Sam has been talking, asking question after question about the visions, the demons, Shannon's life, her experiences, hell.
"Anything's possible, Dean." Shannon smiles at him and blinks slowly, and he's getting better at figuring out when, as right now, the she-demon is driving.
"Last I checked, living people can't just walk into hell."
"You can if you know how to get there," she says.
"And what about Dad, what if we can't find him, or he's different, or--" Dean takes a steadying breath. "He died," he says, remembering the antiseptic smell of the hospital, the frenzied crush of doctors and nurses, tubes and machines beeping around the bed. "We saw him die. We burned the bones."
She sits beside him on the couch, so close he can feel the heat radiating from her body, Shannon's body. "It wasn't natural," she says. "And imprisonment isn't the same as death." Her voice is low and soft, comforting and warm as the one in his dreams. It's a promise Dean wants to believe so badly he can hardly breathe.
Demons lie. He swallows back the sour acid that rises in his throat and looks over at Sam, who is studying the girl-- demon-- like she's a puzzle he's almost solved.
"Time in hell is different for everyone. I don't know exactly what you'll find when you find him. I met him once. He was strong. If anyone has a chance…" She rests a hand on Dean's shoulder. He shrugs it away.
"All I can do is to show you the way. If that's what you want." She stands and stretches, selects a new suit from the closet, and takes a fresh pair of heels. "Now if you'll excuse me, I think it's time I ought to change."
The door closes behind her with a small click, and Sam and Dean are alone in the office. Afternoon light slants through the window, orange and fiery red. It bounces off the pictures on the walls, advertisements from successful campaigns, Shannon smiling with arms thrown around her friends and family and her little, white dog.
Dean clears his throat. "What d'you think?" he asks.
Sam hesitates. "You think we can trust her?"
"No."
Dean reconsiders. "But that doesn't mean she's not telling the truth." He runs his hand over his face, suddenly exhausted. "I don't know, man. If she really means it… It's a chance. It's the only chance we've got to get him back, and no matter what he--" He shakes his head. "We need him, Sam."
"But to go into hell?"
"You know he'd do the same for either of us."
Sam's jaw is tight. "Would he? Dean, the last few months-- You've already forgiven him?"
"It's not-- He's family," Dean says simply. "Doesn't matter what happened. There's nothing to forgive."
"Yeah," Sam almost smiles. "I know. But that's not the only-- What if this is one of the demon's tricks? What if she's trying to get us there, to get me, there?"
Dean closes his eyes. "I could go alone."
"No," Sam says almost before the words are out of his mouth.
"Well, we got no other options, then." He stands and paces. He's restless and ready to decide. "Together or not at all. You're the intuitive one. What do you think? Is she the real thing?"
Sam takes a small framed picture of Shannon and woman--her mother, he guesses--from the desk. He turns it slowly in his hands, watching the light play on the surface of the glass, their smiles shining behind it, and thinks over all the things they've just heard, about demonic grudges, a girl willingly possessed, visions and dreams, about Dad and deals, and the ever-growing list of questions he might never have another chance to ask. "I think," he finally says, weighing each word. "I think this whole thing is crazy enough, makes so little sense… that it might just be true."
~
Author: Krisomniac
Rating, Warning, pairing: R, two very tasty brothers, gen
Disclaimer: Not mine. No profit or copyright infringement intended.
Author's Note: Many thanks to ignipes and amchara, without your help, I never would've gotten this one right. Second (although I'm splitting it into two entries) of a three-part story. More coming soon.
Summary: Sam has visions. Dean drives in New York. Demons ride subways, and hell is an office building on Fifth. (this part ~4000 words)
part one
City of Lost Things
Part Two: Enemies in Friends
1.
~
"We're here to see Miss Gregory, Shultz Advertising."
The security guard skims through the list on his computer screen. He's got the lazy, bored and vaguely threatening look of a Rottweiler lying in the sun, half-chewed bone in its jaws. "What'd you say your names were, again?"
"Eric Bloom and Andrew Winters." Sam can hear the impatient edge in Dean's voice, an edge that has grown sharper with each checkpoint they're sent to. Dean scratches around the collar of his dress shirt before continuing. "We're from Blue Oyster Packaging."
"Hey." The security guard looks at them, trying to figure them out like a man in the shower fumbling for a very slippery bar of soap. "Your names, aren't they the--"
"We get that all the time." There's such finality to Dean's words that the guard doesn’t question them further.
They've already had their bags searched and licenses examined twice. Sam figures they're lucky that no one was there to take their fingerprints or DNA. He idly looks over the heads of the people-- businessmen to sandwich delivery boys-- with valid IDs, swiping in and out of the elevators.
And freezes.
Wordlessly, he grabs Dean's arm.
Under his breath, Dean hisses, "What?"
It's Sessions. Sam recognized him immediately. The way he carries himself, as though there's no one else in the room, the suit that's just a little more pressed and polished than any one else's, with the same hair and cold eyes as he saw in his dream last night. Sam watches Sessions pass through the checkpoints unhindered and enter an elevator.
"It's him," he whispers to Dean.
Dean tenses, ready to bolt up the stairs, only falling still when Sam rests a hand on his shoulder. Sam drums his fingers on the desk until the guard hands him a heavy pass with bar code to get in and out of the building. They turn to leave.
"One moment, mister… Not you. You."
Dean rolls his eyes and whispers to Sam to be careful. His smile is wide, bright and utterly fake as he turns back to the lobby.
By the time he gets to the elevators, Sam is sure he's already too late. Pressing the button for fifty-seven, he feels a familiar creeping tension snaking its way up his neck and around the base of his skull. No matter how hard he tries, he can't control it, can't make it stop.
Not now. Not now.
Sagging against the wall, he presses the button again and takes a deep breath.
~
Shannon glances at the clock. It fills the silence with a soft ticking that counts down the seconds until--
"Miss Gregory, Mr. Sessions here to see you."
She exhales, and this time Sam is looking for the flash of green from her eyes. "Send him in."
Bright, blinding sunlight fills the room, arcing like lightning into Sam's mind before it swirls into a dizzying ocean of blue. And when it clears, she's sprawled on the rooftop below.
Blood trickles from the corner of her mouth, redder than the sun in her hair. She sits up and stares at Sam.
"Help me," she says this time, and in her face he sees only a lost and broken girl. "You have to stop him."
~
Sam feels the elevator slow. A wave of motion sickness breaks over him--whether from the rapid ascent or memory of the fall, he's not sure. The hand rail digs into his back, and he pushes himself up as the bell rings discreetly. Sam blinks away the pain in his head, orienting himself. Dean is still downstairs; he's all alone.
The light behind the button labeled fifty-seven blinks off. Sam clenches his teeth and hopes he's not too late.
The doors to the elevator open on the brightly-lit and fashionably-decorated offices of Schultz Advertising. At the same moment, the doors one car over gently close.
Sessions is gone.
In a daze, Sam approaches the perky secretary outside Miss Gregory's office.
"Are you here to see Miss Gregory?"
He nods and continues on.
"One moment. I'll ring her-- hey, wait! You can't just go in there!"
He barely registers her protests as he walks into the empty office. The window is open and a wintry breeze blows papers off their neat stacks on the desk, scattering them like dead leaves on the floor.
The secretary closes the window, shivering. "I'm sorry-- I don't know where she-- must've left while I wasn't looking. Why don't you have a seat and I'll just go find her. Have a seat while you wait. I know she won't want to miss you." She nervously points to a plush leather chair with carved lion heads on the arms. Then she slips out of the room and shuts the door quietly behind her.
Sam doesn't trust his own voice, doesn't look out the window. Dizzy and weak, he sinks into the empty chair and rests his head in his hands.
Less than a minute passes, or maybe it's five, before the door opens again. Dean slides to a stop in front of him. "Sorry, man. I don't know why security never trusts my good intentions… Sam?"
"Yeah." He doesn't even bother to mention that Dean's problem with security probably stems from the fact that he needs a concealed weapons license just to get dressed in the morning.
"You okay?"
"We're too late."
Dean walks over to the window, opens it, and leans out. "Ugh. Have you--"
"I've seen it."
"Well, if your visions were right, she's not really dead."
"She asked me to help. I couldn't."
"We--"
"Got here too late. Don't even know how to find Sessions." He pauses, remembering the look on her face, so young… "And she looks awfully dead from up here."
"Hey," Dean takes his shoulders. "We'll figure this out, but we've got to get to her first. How many flights down is she?" He walks back to the window, gauging the distance. "You think I can make it?"
"Don't be an idiot," Sam says, "Last time I checked, you still couldn't fly. We can get to that roof from the inside."
Dean flashes a quick, knowing smile, and they leave the offices of Schultz Advertising through the front door.
~
"Why, exactly, do we have to walk up?" Dean huffs. He's already pulled off his tie and opened the first few buttons of his shirt.
"No security cameras," Sam explains again. "Unless you want them confiscating your things."
Ahead of him, Dean's hand closes reflexively on the gun tucked in his waistband and he pats the book of exorcisms tucked into his jacket.
"Plus, I thought you could use the exercise, pudgy."
For a moment, he thinks Dean is going to tackle him down the stairs, but instead he rolls his eyes, deciding to save his energy for the next eight flights up.
They burst through the door to the roof, both gasping for breath and looking to either side for the body.
"Here," Dean yells. "Over here."
Sam skids to a stop beside him. It's Shannon and up close, the damage is worse. Her ribcage looks deflated, caved in on one side. The heel of one shoe is broken, and her elbows protrude at angles Sam never wants to see again. She's no longer bleeding, her heart having long ago stopped, but there are dry splatters all around the body. It smells faintly of iron and meat left too long in the sun.
The strange thing, the thing Sam never felt in his visions, is that she's throwing off heat. It surrounds them and seems to quiet the wind. He can see it rising off her body in waves.
"What do we--"
Sam's question is cut short as Shannon gasps once, twice, and opens her eyes. One by one, she begins to sort out her limbs, straightening her arms and legs and lastly, her hair. She arches her back and sits up, rolls her neck slowly and wipes the blood from her lips. Coughing quietly while her ribcage expands, she stands, examines her broken heel, and looks up at Sam and Dean.
"Oh, don’t worry," she says with a wave of her hand. "I've got a change of clothes in my office." She scratches at the stains on her white silk blouse. "The dry cleaner is going to have a hell of a time getting these out." Raising one eyebrow, she adds, "You couldn't have gotten here before they dried, boys?"
Dean had pulled the ancient rites from his pocket the moment she began to move, and he's standing to the side now, whispering words of an exorcism Sam can't quite make out.
Sam walks forward. "What just happened? How did you survive?"
"And they told me you were the smart one." She licks her lips, meeting his gaze. "What happened is that I called and you came. As for how I survived--"
Her eyes fire green as Sam feels Dean's hand on his arm, grip tight, pulling him away from the demon girl.
"Just ask your brother."
"Exert tua virtute et fortitudinem levi sue benedectis," Dean says, book open his hand, Dad's old rosary beads twined around his fingers. It's the end of the ritual. "One more word." He grins cruelly. "Give me one good reason not to send you back to hell."
Shannon remains perfectly calm. "Just one?" She smiles, snake-like. "How's this? I know what you're hunting, who you're hunting. I know it's too big for the two of you to take on alone. You need my help." She studies each of them for a reaction. Dean's face is a blank mask; she steps toward him.
"I also know where your father is, Dean. I can take you to him."
He hasn't moved, but meets her gaze with silent fury.
"And in case you've forgotten--" She's standing inches from Dean, her hand on his chest, iridescent eyes staring up at him. "There's Shannon to consider."
"Trapped inside her own body," he says, voice low and livid. "Who do you think-- I'm doing this for Shannon."
"Really?" Her breath catches in her throat and she sags against his chest, crumpled and close like a child. The air around them chills, wind whipping at their clothing and hair, and the everyday sounds of the city drift up from the street below. For a moment no one moves, then Shannon breathes again. She backs a step away from Dean. Sam wonders what's happened to make her look so different, afraid.
"You're not doing this for me," she says.
It's her eyes. They're just… human.
"Close the book, Dean… please?" She looks so sad; Dean doesn't move. "That is your name, right, Dean? I'm Shannon."
He grunts his assent.
She reaches up and touches the bruise on his cheek. "I'm sorry about yesterday." Steps back awkwardly on the broken heel. "But I can't let you finish. You do understand?"
"No." Sam breaks the silence. "You're a demon. Of course you don't want us to--"
"I am not a demon. She's here, inside me, but I'm not her." Shannon explains herself patiently, as though to a child. "I'm just a woman. Sam? I've seen you, in your dreams. You know this is me."
"Right," Dean snorts. "Because demons never lie."
"Think," she says, voice insistent. "Is this like any exorcism you've seen before?"
"Well." He considers. "It's not so much with the head spinning or pea soup, but that doesn't mean--"
"It means everything, Dean. You've never exorcised a willing victim, and you're working alone here. I'm not going to help you send her back to hell."
"I don't understand." Dean blinks, teeth clenched. "You-- you want this? To be possessed?"
"I can explain." She raises her rust-stained shirt and runs her fingers over a softly curved waist and stomach. "It was a hunter," she tells them. "Like you."
Dean stares at the pale, unblemished skin. "I don't see anything," he says, then grins. "Well, that's not entirely true--"
"I was walking home from a party downtown." She lets the shirt fall. "A man was being chased down an alley across the street. I don't know what he had done, but his eyes were strange, and I pressed myself against the building, praying he wouldn't see me. I was so scared. I've never been so scared." She looks afraid, just recalling it. "The demon inside him saw, of course, and the moment before he crumpled into a heap at my feet, she knew how frightened I was. The hunter was only a few steps behind."
"Oh." Sam thinks he understands. "He killed you," he says quietly.
"Sixteen bullets. Consecrated iron." She pauses, skating her hands over the fabric as though remembering each one as it entered her body. "He didn't know what he was hunting, or that the bullets wouldn't harm it. All he saw was that the thing he'd been chasing was inside of me. Desperate to destroy her, he didn't care who else died. He was a killer, but the demon saved me that night. And she has given me life every day since."
Shannon meets each of their eyes. "It may not be the kind of life you're used to, but it's mine and I don't want to die."
Silence descends again.
"That is the stupidest--" Dean pulls out the book and the beads, and he takes control of the situation again. Sam recognizes the dangerous gleam in his eye. "Did you ever once stop to consider the danger you were in, that you put everyone around you in? You can't control it. No one can." He steps up, towering over her. "It can kill, whatever, whenever." Then he adds, eyes narrowing suspiciously, "What happened to that hunter, anyway?"
"No worse than he deserved." Shannon doesn't back down.
"You killed him. Or the demon killed him. It's all the same." He tosses the book and beads to Sam, pulls a vial of holy water from his pocket. "Sam, start. All they want is death and destruct--"
"Wait!" Her shout is piercing in its desperation, and Dean pauses mid-sentence. Sam continues to whisper the words of the exorcism.
"You still don't understand. She can help you. She knows the one you're fighting, and she wants hell on earth about as much as you do."
"She what?"
"She's trying to stop it but can't work alone any more than you can, than anyone can. His plans are too big. His spies are everywhere."
"You expect me to believe in good demons now?" Dean stops just short of laughing in her face.
"Not good, just one who happens to like things here, the way they are." She calms the moment they begin to listen. "Just imagine what would happen if a demon learned it's more fun to fuck a man than watch him bleed, that red wine tastes better than burnt ground. Possession works both ways, Dean. I know her. Better than anyone. Can't you even admit the possibility that maybe you're wrong?"
Sam pauses, Latin syllables hanging in the air. "Dean, maybe--"
"No, Sam. There is no exception to this rule."
"But what if there is?" Shannon's voice is soft, now, and full of promise. "I could've jumped off this roof anytime. I could've thrown you. But you're here for a reason. She called you. Stop the exorcism. Talk to her. Put those things away. Let us help you in good faith. Let us help you find your father. Then decide."
Dean clenches his jaw and looks at Sam, his face a mask of conflicted emotion, desperate and terrified to believe. Sam is only sure of one thing; he brought them here. Whether or not he wants it, it's his call.
With the heady feeling of someone standing at the edge of a cliff, he lowers his hands. "How long have you been possessed?" he asks.
"Four years."
"She said she brought me here."
"She did, but it's a very long story, and I only know a small part."
"We have all the time in the world." Dean's tone is low and angry, and he keeps the holy water poised.
"The demon you're hunting, the one who killed your mother, your girlfriend--" Shannon looks slowly from Dean to Sam, and her voice takes on a quiet, rhythmic quality. "The one who took your father in exchange for your life, who you've chased for a year now, she's been running from him for lifetimes. She commanded his legion at the dawn of time."
Dean snorts. "Right. And god made the world in seven days."
She looks at him sharply. "Whether or not it happened, doesn't make a story less true."
Sam prompts her, "Go on."
"After the war that split heaven and hell, she came to earth to cause sickness and death, to make storms that would raze the crops and lay villages to the ground. She killed men and possessed them, but she learned from them, too. Living here so long, eating with them, sharing their lives and their loves-- it changed her." Shannon pauses and licks her lips thoughtfully.
"One day, she abandoned her task and has been running from her liege ever since. She knows his ways; it's how she has remained hidden for so long. But the time for hiding is over. He grows strong, and she must-- I must-- go to hell to erase her name. I can't go alone and she can't come with me, so she called you to us. She led him to me knowing that if he sent his soldiers, you would see, and you would come. She knew you could help."
"Help you what?"
"Get to hell. In exchange, she will show you where your father is imprisoned."
"But," Sam protests, eyebrows knitted. "Why choose us?"
She raises an eyebrow. "Because you have a reasonable chance of getting in and out alive. Because the demon has something you want. Because she could. But most of all, because there isn't anyone else who can save me, or save your father."
Dad. Sam swallows around the knot in the back of his throat. His mouth is dry and he doesn't know how to respond. "You really believe this?"
She nods. "With all my heart." The wind whips around them, clear and cold.
"What's it like?" he finally asks.
Shannon smiles, the first genuine smile he's seen today, and it lights the heavy shadows under her eyes. "It's like-- you two share a car? Sometimes one drives, sometimes the other, but you're both agreed on the destination and never could travel any other way. On long road trips, when there's nothing but scrub trees outside the window and the radio reception is shit, when you have nothing to do but talk or sleep, you get to know each other, until you know your brother better than anyone else in the world."
Sam nods.
"So you understand the concept. Now imagine the car is your body, the road trip your life, and you'll have almost the tiniest glimpse of understanding what it's like." She closes her eyes and sighs. "It isn't a bad thing." She wraps her arms around herself, shivering in the wind. "It's cold here, and they'll wonder where I am. Come back to my office, and I'll answer all your questions there."
She walks over to the top of the stairs, where the door is still hanging open.
"And Dean," she says, turning, "in all the time I've been--as you call it--possessed, we've never killed a soul."
~
2.
~
"It's not possible," Dean finally says. He feels dazed-- as though his brain is stuffed with cotton and strong liquor-- and has been ever since they left the roof, his jacket draped over Shannon's shoulders to hide the blood on her clothes. He can't shake the feeling that they're walking willingly into a trap, but he can't figure out how it's going to spring.
Sam has been talking, asking question after question about the visions, the demons, Shannon's life, her experiences, hell.
"Anything's possible, Dean." Shannon smiles at him and blinks slowly, and he's getting better at figuring out when, as right now, the she-demon is driving.
"Last I checked, living people can't just walk into hell."
"You can if you know how to get there," she says.
"And what about Dad, what if we can't find him, or he's different, or--" Dean takes a steadying breath. "He died," he says, remembering the antiseptic smell of the hospital, the frenzied crush of doctors and nurses, tubes and machines beeping around the bed. "We saw him die. We burned the bones."
She sits beside him on the couch, so close he can feel the heat radiating from her body, Shannon's body. "It wasn't natural," she says. "And imprisonment isn't the same as death." Her voice is low and soft, comforting and warm as the one in his dreams. It's a promise Dean wants to believe so badly he can hardly breathe.
Demons lie. He swallows back the sour acid that rises in his throat and looks over at Sam, who is studying the girl-- demon-- like she's a puzzle he's almost solved.
"Time in hell is different for everyone. I don't know exactly what you'll find when you find him. I met him once. He was strong. If anyone has a chance…" She rests a hand on Dean's shoulder. He shrugs it away.
"All I can do is to show you the way. If that's what you want." She stands and stretches, selects a new suit from the closet, and takes a fresh pair of heels. "Now if you'll excuse me, I think it's time I ought to change."
The door closes behind her with a small click, and Sam and Dean are alone in the office. Afternoon light slants through the window, orange and fiery red. It bounces off the pictures on the walls, advertisements from successful campaigns, Shannon smiling with arms thrown around her friends and family and her little, white dog.
Dean clears his throat. "What d'you think?" he asks.
Sam hesitates. "You think we can trust her?"
"No."
Dean reconsiders. "But that doesn't mean she's not telling the truth." He runs his hand over his face, suddenly exhausted. "I don't know, man. If she really means it… It's a chance. It's the only chance we've got to get him back, and no matter what he--" He shakes his head. "We need him, Sam."
"But to go into hell?"
"You know he'd do the same for either of us."
Sam's jaw is tight. "Would he? Dean, the last few months-- You've already forgiven him?"
"It's not-- He's family," Dean says simply. "Doesn't matter what happened. There's nothing to forgive."
"Yeah," Sam almost smiles. "I know. But that's not the only-- What if this is one of the demon's tricks? What if she's trying to get us there, to get me, there?"
Dean closes his eyes. "I could go alone."
"No," Sam says almost before the words are out of his mouth.
"Well, we got no other options, then." He stands and paces. He's restless and ready to decide. "Together or not at all. You're the intuitive one. What do you think? Is she the real thing?"
Sam takes a small framed picture of Shannon and woman--her mother, he guesses--from the desk. He turns it slowly in his hands, watching the light play on the surface of the glass, their smiles shining behind it, and thinks over all the things they've just heard, about demonic grudges, a girl willingly possessed, visions and dreams, about Dad and deals, and the ever-growing list of questions he might never have another chance to ask. "I think," he finally says, weighing each word. "I think this whole thing is crazy enough, makes so little sense… that it might just be true."
~