Chapter 5

[adrenalineshots]

ABU SIMBEL


There is a world of difference between the way a person walks when they can see the ground in front of them and when they can’t.

Even led by Sam, Dean finds himself second-guessing every step that he takes, trying and failing over and over again to not tip toe his way around. He can’t help it though. If he sets the ball of his foot down first, like he has done he’s whole life, he feels like he’s about to fall into a endless hole in the half-moment that it takes for the rest of the foot to land. So he tiptoes. Like a fucking ballerina.

Of course, it’s doing nothing for Dean’s precarious sense of balance to walk on ground that keeps shifting with each foot he sets down.

Sam is literally leading him by the arm, which helps to keep him from face planting and eating dirt, but pisses Dean off to no end.

In all honesty, it scares him more than it angers him. He’s helpless, a dead weight that can’t even tell left from right properly and, despite all the crap that he fed his brother and Bobby, Dean knows that there is no way he’ll be able to hold his own if it ever comes to fighting their way in or out of that place.

But the vision of Sam, burning in Castiel’s place, is ingrained into Dean’s brain and more than anything, he wants Sam as far away from here as possible.

But that will never happen.

Even if Dean tells his brother the details about his last dream, he knows that there is no chance either of them could ever agree to just turn away now, to abandon Castiel to his fate and go home.

And blind as he is, Hell would freeze over twice before Sam would allow Dean to go anywhere without him, so Dean will just have to do his best to keep his brother safe.

Inside his head, in the privacy of his own thoughts, Dean is laughing really hard at that idea.

Keep Sam safe.

It’s been a while since Dean has been able to keep Sam safe. Not since he let himself slip up and allowed Sam to die.

After that fateful day where he could do nothing more than stand there, in the rain, screaming at Sam to be careful and watch that kid stab his brother in the back... it all became a competition as to who lost more. And they were both in the running for the first prize.

With the looming threat of Lucifer’s escape and the end of the world on his shoulders, Sam had started to listen to the wrong people, laying off and bending rules that should never be touched.

Distracted by sleepless nights and regular re-runs of his life in Hell inside his head, Dean had stood by and watched as Sam slowly slipped through his fingers and in to Ruby’s hands.

Dean hadn’t been able to protect Sam from her; hadn’t been able to protect his brother from becoming addicted to demon-blood to the point it almost killed him again; and he had been too late to stop Sam from making the biggest mistake of his life.

In the department of big brothers’ protection, that was some real stellar work right there.

And that had all been when Dean could actually see events unfold.

Now... now Dean was working on a give-me-a-clue basis.

The ground beneath his feet goes from straight, firm and rough to inclined, crunchy and loose, so Dean figures they have left the parking lot and crossed over to some sort of gravel hill. It’s not very steep, but infinitely worse than straight ground. Each step that Dean takes makes his balance worse, feet uncertain of which angle to land, hesitant and searching for the ground.

Dean struggles forward, chewing the inside of his mouth to stop himself from screaming. He’s used to taking long steps, sure of himself and of where he’s going; this... this geisha-size, shy steps get on his nerves and make the trek seem eternal.

The air gets colder as they progress and there is a faint moist scent about it, so Dean figures that there must be water nearby even though he can’t hear it. He knows there has to be some sort of lake nearby, he remembers it from the dreams, but it’s either the stillest water surface in the planet or still at some distance away.

When Sam’s grip on his arm grows tighter, Dean figures that either someone is coming and they’re screwed or they’ve arrive.

“We’re here,” Sam whispers.



There is a golden light that shines directly bellow the colossal statues of the four, seated pharaohs, that makes them look as if they are made of gold instead of stone. It is a vision that Sam has only seen before on the TV, some late night Discovery program or another that he can no longer recall. In the small screen, filmed in artistic angles and with over-dramatic background music, the statues had looked more fake than awe-inspiring.

Now, with the artificial lights mimicking sunlight and the way the pharaohs sit, as if patiently waiting for the sun-god’s return, Sam can understand all the fuss about this place. It is truly a wondrous sight, one that Sam fervently hopes will still be standing after the events of that night. Moreover, he hopes Dean's sight will return in time for him to see it before they leave...

Once they are in clear view of the two fake mountains housing the temples of Abu Simbel, there isn’t much room to hide. The two miles that separate the front of the temple from the fenced perimeter of the artificial lake are nothing but flat land, from which the wind rips occasional clouds of dust.

To the far right of the first temple, stands the second one at an angle, its façade hidden from view. It’s easily a half a mile away from where they stand and the only place where they can find some sort of feeble cover directly below them. Five rows of wooden chairs are set in lines, forming a perfect square that faces the temple, empty seats waiting for a show.

Sam, Dean and Emam lie still on the sand between those chairs, still warm from the heat of the day, and wait.

It takes them little more than an hour of observation to get the feel of the routine of the guards; their shift changes and usual routes. From the way Dean is fidgeting more and more by his side, Sam is sure that it must feel like an eternity for him.

Most of the guards have gone home for the day. Not all, though. Two guards, armed with automatic machine guns and hip holsters containing what look like 9mms semi-automatics, pass through the entrance of each temple every hour. There is another guard, with a big black dog in tow, on top of the mountain, doing rounds every thirty minutes. Which gives them less than that to get in, search Castiel and get him out.

Inside the temples, not even a soul moves.

“Which one is the Ramses temple?” Sam asks, his voice barely carrying in the silent night.

Emam points to the bigger one, nearer to them and Sam is thankful for that. The guard on top has just finished his round and they can’t waste any amount of time.

“You ready?” Sam asks, his fingers curling around the fabric of Dean’s jacket.

It is one thing to be close to his brother and watch where he steps as they walk; it is another to run with someone holding on to you. And they both know that they’ll have to run. Fast.

“Let’s go,” Dean states, fingers curling around Sam’s wrists in turn.

Three pairs of feet, running over loose and dusty ground, would raise enough dirt to alert any experienced guard. Two of the men running across the empty plateau are hunters though, and they know how to move fast and undetected. They’ve been doing it almost since they learned how to walk. The third man moves as inconspicuously as them, having lived most of his life around that same dry and dusty soil. He might not be an experienced hunter, but he knows how to land his footfalls well enough to be stealthy.

As they reach the locked entrance, almost hidden between two of the gigantic statues, Sam looks back, pleased to see that their approach has, apparently, gone unnoticed. At least, the telling signs of shouting guards and blaring alarms are blissfully absent.

From up close, the statues look more regal, sitting there like judges, closely watching their every move. Sam bends his neck backwards in a futile attempt to see their tops, struck by the bizarre notion that those are the biggest noses that he’s ever seen. His attention quickly turns to the metal grated door that bars the entry to the temple. The lock, hanging from heavy chains, is pathetically easy for Sam to pick.

“You better stay here,” Sam whispers, his hand on Dean’s shoulder, preventing him from going any further as soon as he hears the lock clicking open. “I’ll check it out with Emam, make sure that this is the right temple.”

Dean is shaking his head already. “That’s a bad idea Sam. I’m coming with,” he insists, trying to free himself from Sam’s hold. As soon as he’s successful in that endeavor, Dean manages to almost walk straight into a wall of stone. “Goddamit!” he hisses under his breath.

“Dean-” Sam’s voice is soft for reasons that have nothing to do with their need for stealth. Emam is considerate enough to turn his back even though Dean can’t see to appreciate the gesture. “I need my attention to be on this demon and whoever else it has in there guarding Cas, if Cas is even here. I can’t-“

“Be distracting yourself with me,” Dean finishes for him. “I get it... I really do. But Sam...” Dean’s hand fumbles around until he catches Sam’s arm. His fingers convulse around the fabric of his shirt and Sam hates the look he sees in his brother’s unveiled eyes. “You have to promise me that you’ll be very careful in there... any sign of trouble, just-“

Sam swallows his emotions, abstaining from mentioning that Dean is the one who’ll be left alone out there, unable to protect himself.
“You should keep the knife.”

Dean lets go of Sam’s arm, eyebrows scowling in annoyance.
“And what? Stick it in the first demon that considerately taps me on the shoulder?”

“I-“

“I’ll be fine...” Dean interrupts. “Now, quit wasting time and get going. I’ll stay here... keep watch,” Dean finishes with an annoying smirk.

“That’s not funny,” Sam warns him as he enters the dark temple. Emam follows him in silence.



Dean leans back against the cold stone of the entryway. The door is narrow enough that, reaching one arm out, his fingertips brush against the other side. If he stays exactly in that spot, Dean knows that there is no way anyone will be able to go in or out with out without touching him.

It doesn’t take long for the adrenaline rush of actually being there, to wear off and for boredom to set in. For a second, Dean entertains the idea of humming a song. Metallica never failed to smooth his nerves, but he doesn't risk it now, even if the song’s length would help him to get a measure of how much time it had passed. In the dark, Dean has no way to tell but it certainly feels like hours since Sam and Emam went in. Try as he might, Dean can’t hear a thing from inside.

Dean’s not sure if that’s a good or a very bad sign.

Outside, everything sounds as quiet and empty as before. Without his eyes to tell him if their presence has been discovered or if they’re about to have company of the wrong sort, Dean’s other senses are on high alert. Every small rustle of wind sounds like a miniature dust storm to his ears; the old stone seems to grow warm under the touch of his fingers and even the dirt of the desert seems to have found a way into Dean’s mouth.

The flash of intense light comes without warning. A lightning bolt landing inches away.

Dean gasps, curls in on himself, hands thrown around his head. He’s not sure if the attack is coming from outside or from inside his own brain. It ends too quickly for Dean to find out which.

His immediate assessment is that the local authorities have discovered them. That the intense bright light is nothing but the blare of security lights and he’s most certainly now facing a large group of guards, all with their guns pointing at him.

But that would mean actually seeing the guards’ floodlights. That would mean having his eyesight back.
Dean finds himself disappointed when he opens his eyes and finds the world just as dark as before.

No floodlights.

No guards either, if the silence is anything to go by. No cocking of guns, no angry shouting, no bark of dogs.

Which means that it was all inside his head. Some sort of electrical discharge. Maybe his vision saying its last bye-bye. Maybe fighting to return. Maybe some other aftereffect of the drug-

The feeling of a wet tongue licking his right hand is unexpected and disturbing enough to elicit a distressed yelp out of Dean.

Heart hammering against his ribcage, Dean bits his lip too late. The sound is already out and if those guards are anywhere nearby, they would’ve heard it for sure. ‘Rookie move Dean... real rookie move.’

Crouching down, Dean reaches out his wet hand until it meets fur and an equally wet and round nose. There’s some sniffing sound, short puffs of air and short whiskers tickling against the sensitive skin of Dean’s palm.

A dog.

Dean can't help the curve of his mouth as he stoops slightly, allowing his fingers to trace the contours of the animal’s tilted head. The animal's side to side sway telltales a happily wagging tail. Locating the animal’s head, Dean offers his hand for the dog to smell, letting the animal know that he poses no threat. The dog puffs out a content breath and Dean takes a minute to trace the contours of the animal’s tilted head, taking in the long snout, the unblinking eyes and finally ending in it’s long pointy ears, standing up like antenna at the top of the head.

A fairly big dog, if the size of its head is anything to go by.

For a moment Dean worries that this is the guard’s dog that Sam had told him about before, that instead of warning Sam that they have company like he should, he’s entertaining himself petting the guard’s animal. But this animal is quiet, not making a sound since he’s neared Dean -which would make him the worst guard-dog ever. Besides, the dog that Sam had described sounded very different from the one currently sniffing happily at Dean’s chest, as if looking for treats.
The way his brother described the big black guard-dog, with a short snout, like a Rottweiler, had made Dean imagine something closer to a Hellhound than anything else.

Sliding his hand along the dog’s side, Dean can feel the soft, longish fur, smooth as cotton. The animal’s coat is too long for it to be a Doberman or a Labrador, but not long enough to be a Golden Retriever. If Dean had to guess, he’d say it’s a German Sheppard. In his head, Dean is picturing Mile-Oh, Mr. Gusheim’s white dog.

Mile-Oh, or mile zero as the old man used to call him, had been named so because he’d been found on the side of the road, sitting near a milestone. He would’ve died there too, if the old man hadn’t stopped to pick him up, or so he used to tell them over and over again.

Dean had been close to seven when dad rented the house next to Mr. Gusheim’s. They stayed there for close to half a year and that white German Sheppard was as close to having a dog as Dean had ever come in his whole life.

The animal had been so big and docile that, at six, Dean could ride him like a horse and the dog wouldn’t even bat an eyelash.
Mile-Oh was his white horse and on top of him, Dean was a valiant prince who fought dragons and monsters and killed all the evil things that stole mommies away from little kids.

“What you doing all the way here, buddy? Did you get lost?” Dean whispers softly. The dog's coat, from what Dean can feel, isn't matted, or full of burrs and bugs, in fact it's not only smooth but in good condition. This is no stray dog. They’d driven for miles to get there. He can’t possibly imagine from where a dog like that could’ve come from. Maybe he’s from one of the shop owners, left behind at the end of the day...

The dog’s wet tongue finds Dean’s nose, thoroughly slobbering his face as an answer.

And that’s when the sounds of struggle inside the temple reaches Dean’s ears.



Sam’s stomach is steadily working itself in to tight knots. Circumstances keep forcing him in to a series of decisions that do not sit well with the younger Winchester. Decisions that spell trouble no matter how he looks at them.

There is no way Sam can ever say it to Bobby’s face and expect to survive, but the idea of leaving the older man alone in an unfamiliar place, with nothing else but the Colt and a car that was not adapted to Bobby’s condition, is crazy. Just about as crazy as thinking that the older hunter would ever actually use that car to escape and leave them there, but Sam hates the fact that the choice is not even available just the same.

And then there is the small fact that Sam is currently exploring the inside of a potentially hostile place with a perfect stranger -something that again, fails to settle his churning guts- because Dean is blind.

Blind.

It grates on Sam’s nerves to even try the word in the privacy of his own head. What the hell were they going to do if Dean’s vision never came back?

How would they possibly go on doing what they do if Dean can’t see? How can they have a fighting chance in those circumstances?

The argument that blind people live fulfilling lives just as much as everybody else pops in Sam’s head, unearthed from some seminar or lecture he must’ve sat through in Stanford, about the rights of the disabled and handicapped. And God, it actually hurt to think of Dean in those terms...

The politically correct speech that the visually impaired are just as valid and contributive to society as every other Joe rings true, but the thing that makes Sam despair is that ‘every other Joe’ isn’t trying to stop Lucifer from destroying the world; that ‘every other Joe’ doesn’t have half of Heaven and every demon in Hell on his tail, trying to force its agenda down his throat or simply kill him.

Even if they manage to save Castiel, Sam has nothing but realistic hopes about what the angel will be able to do for Dean. Castiel lost much of his power when he decided to stick with the Winchesters, a lousy trade in itself, if you ask anyone, up to and including Cas himself.

Cut off from Heaven, the angel hadn’t been able to fix Bobby’s spine... it was foolish to believe that he would be able to do anything about Dean’s eyes.

Inside the temple is so dark that Sam and Emam are almost as blind as Dean. Moonlight barely makes it a few feet into the main room, coming up shy of touching the feet of the first two statues. Beyond that, there is only darkness.

Neither man dares to use the flashlights. If this is indeed the right place, the intruding lights will surely alert others to their presence and the element of surprise is about the only thing that they have going on for them right now.

They never got the time to really plan it that way, but the minute Sam and Emam step inside the temple, the Winchester goes right and the Egyptian man goes left. And that too disagrees with Sam’s stomach, partly because he’s pretty sure that the older man won’t be able to hold his own if this comes down to a fight, and partly because despite the trust Bobby has in the man, Sam would rather have him by his side than out of sight.

The place feels like a tall cave. Once his eyes adjust to the dim light, Sam can see the central, dual rows of standing statues in front of massive square columns, just like Dean had described them. On each side of the column, a long corridor stretches until it ends in the same back door. Beyond that, Sam can’t see anything else but plastic tarp. The construction work-place.

There is some sort of faint, shimmering blue light coming from the other side of the plastic tarp, so soft and muffled by it that it does little more than turn every shadow more sharp and menacing.

It’s cold inside the dense stone walls, but that doesn’t stop the sweat drops from sliding down the side of Sam’s face, tickling trails until it pools at the base of his throat. He grips the knife tighter, the smooth feeling of wood in his palm reassuring.

The ground under his feet is not stone or dust as Sam had expected. Instead, he finds himself walking on long boards of wood, cursing at himself whenever his foot lands wrong and produces a faint squeak.

From the other side, Sam can’t hear a thing; Emam is moving as silently as a wraith through the passageways.

There is no sulfur in the air. The fact registers immediately on Sam’s mind, more than used to pick out the small details that often alert to a demon’s presence. The oddity only makes Sam tense some more.

With his senses turn up high and his body tense and attuned to every change in the room, when Sam hears Dean’s surprised gasp outside, it feels like a bomb going off inside his chest. His heart jumps to his throat and only years of training engraved so deep that it has become a second skin, keep Sam from dropping everything and racing to his brother. He still turns towards the door though. He can’t help that.

Because Sam knows Dean. He knows that his brother would never compromise their position. Even blind, Sam knows that if that sound was pushed out of Dean’s mouth, something big must’ve caused.

Before Sam can drive himself insane pondering all the possible scenarios that could’ve lead to that; before he can weigh all the reasons why he should have never left Dean alone and helpless, and how much guilt he will be feeling if he does nothing and his brother gets hurt, Sam freezes.

One of the shadows that he passed by and dismissed as being cast by the giant statues, moves. Sam moves with it.

There is a clatter of metal hitting stone right in the exact same spot that Sam had been just half a second before, and he recognizes the soft zzzzztatatatata noise of an active taser gun.

The demon-killing knife hits its target before the electric weapon finishes its discharge. There is a satisfying slash sound and the splatter of arterial blood hitting the wall, quickly followed by the heavy thud of a body hitting the ground.

What is painfully absent, as Sam notices, is the fire coming from the demon’s split throat.

Since the first time Sam witnessed that blade at work, back when they had been fighting - and losing - against the seven deadly sins and Ruby had showed up in her first incarnation to kill her fellow demons, Sam had noticed the presence of fire in all the slashes caused by that knife. Little cuts, long cuts, stabs, slashes, gashes... they all seemed to release that small piece of Hell that demons were made of and made them bleed more fire than blood when they were cut.

No fire this time. Just blood. Human. Some local man, from what Sam can dimly see in the almost darkness.

The fact washes over Sam like ice on a hot day. Dean had been so certain that demons were the ones responsible for Castiel’s imprisonment that the idea that humans might be involved hadn’t even crossed their minds. It wasn’t like demons liked to play in teams or anything...

Sam’s surprise costs him his alertness, something he deeply regrets when a second attacker gets a hold of him.

An arm made of pure muscle and killer instincts, wraps itself around Sam’s neck and he can feel the presence of a second tazer gun, pressing hard against the small of his back.

Thrusting back blindly, Sam tries to get his knife to make contact with any part of his attacker.

This guy, however, has better reflexes than the first one. The arm around Sam’s throat tightens and the body behind him dodges enough for the hunter to know that his stabbing motion will hit nothing but air. The movement, however, cost proximity to Sam’s attacker. The gun is no longer in contact with Sam’s body.

Sam wastes no time in pressing his small advantage home. The man is shorter than him. That is a fact that has stopped surprising Sam some years ago. In this particular case, having a good couple of inches on his attacker means that the man holding Sam needs to sacrifice balance in order to have a better grasp on Sam’s neck.

This is a dance move that Sam knows well and has perfected in his sparring sessions with Dean over the years. Because complain as much as he does about the fact that his little brother is a freaking Sasquatch, Dean has never allowed for Sam’s advantage to be ignored in a fight.

Impossibly tall at six foot four, Sam stretches.

The man standing behind him foolishly follows Sam’s move, trying to compensate enough to keep the pressure on the neck, and promptly loses his balance.
From there, Sam has no difficulty in using his weight advantage to drive the man ferociously against the wall.

Sam hears the unfamiliar language, which still sounds like cursing, seconds before the hard thud of a skull hitting unforgiving stone. A second hit strikes the man’s wrist ruthlessly against the wall, and the gun in his lax hand drops to the floor with a soft sound. A taser gun, just like the first one.

In seconds, Sam reverses their positions and when the attacker’s eyes regain their focus, the man finds himself with a hand around his throat and a furious Sam inches from his face.

“Who the hell are you people? Where’s Cas?”

The electric discharge hits Sam from behind, a lightning bolt of pain that starts somewhere in his right shoulder blade and travels everywhere. Hit by the painful contraction, Sam’s hand reacts around the man’s throat. The last thing Sam hears before drowning in a deep well of torment, is the sound of the man’s neck breaking under his fingers and the surprise in the man’s dark, human eyes.



A hard, hollow thunk echoes in the room as Dean's boots hit the solid wood surface inside the temple. The air feels colder and the heat outside is swallowed in the chill of the room and it just... feels darker, even if he can't actually see the evidence. Visual perspective means very little when Dean knows, in perfect detail, what this place looks like, courtesy of Cas' treks in his dreams. Between those mental images and his own internal compass, he feels more oriented than he has anytime since he woke up sightless.

Going over it in his mind, Dean recalls the main corridor, lined with statues and columns on each side and the two smaller passages behind them, each leading to the small chambers at the back.

To walk down the main corridor would be like venturing into the desert without a compass or water. Dean would be utterly lost and most likely, dead before he could do anything.

Which leaves him the passageways in the right and left.

Inside the high ceiling building, all sound echoes, leaving him the sense of being inside a giant metal ball, where noise comes from everywhere, moving everyplace. It's disorienting.

Dean forces himself to stop and stand still for a second, head tilting to the side. Listening.

The sound of a body hitting a hard surface is unmistakable. Limbs collide like bags of bricks; a head clashes with a hollowed sound and air rushes out of the lungs in a moan.

Dean can perfectly imagine the way the body bounces once, like it’s made of rubber, before settling flat. There is a shuffling of feet and the sound of a falling body that never really reaches the ground. Even without the use if his eyes, it’s easy to imagine the body pressed against the wall, held fast by the adversary, advantage taken and used.

What Dean can’t tell from all these sounds is who is pressed against the wall and who is doing the pressing.

Direction is easy to ascertain; the scuffle noise is coming from the right. He is sure of that now.

Keeping his hand glued to the wall, Dean follows its path until he hits a 90-degree angle. The right corner of the temple. The sounds are coming from just ahead.

As he hurries along the wall, Dean can feel the markings and carved figures beneath his fingers, imprints of a different time, revered symbols that had once been sacred and now, serve only as indicators of Dean’s progress forward.

“Who are you people? Where’s Cas?”

Sam’s voice travels like thunder through the wall and even though his brother speaks softly, his words are the first distinct sound that Dean manages to hear.

The sound that follows is also unmistakably familiar.

Even years after the event - forty-five, a lifetime in fact - Dean will never forget how it felt like to have thousands of volts coursing through his body.
The sound of electricity lighting up the air and the sight of actually seeing the energy as it traveled through the water and straight from that Rawhead and into him, are things that Dean will never forget.

Even hit only by the backlash of the 100,000 volts discharge, it had been enough to contract every muscle inside of him, enough to snap his body into such tension that Dean could swear every one of his bones would snap at the stress. He’d been sore for weeks, even after the reaper fixed his heart and the whole experience had made it up there to the top five of the most painful things Dean had ever been put through. And that was including his time in Hell.

So, to once again hear that sizzling sound of electricity running down a wire and punctuate it with Sam’s pain-filled grunt... it’s something Dean wishes he’d never hear.

Dean practically runs, hoping that there is nothing but clear ground ahead of him, praying that he won’t just step into some big, giant chasm and gets swallowed in before he can reach his brother.

More disturbing than Sam’s moans of pain or the sound of his body falling down, is the silence that follows.

With one hand on the wall and the other stretch in front of him, Dean moves with no idea what the hell he's going to do when he reaches the source of the noise but knowing he's got to try. He has no weapon on him, he can’t see his enemy and he has no idea what other weapons might be involved other than the tazer gun.

But Sam is in pain. In danger. And Dean doesn’t stop to rationalize or contemplate outcomes. He can only move forward.

It barely registers as surprise when Dean’s stretched out hand touches something soft. He reacts immediately.

Sam is down, which means that whoever’s vertical, is his attacker. Emam’s position doesn’t even track in Dean’s reasoning. He knows the older man wasn’t a fighter, so, if Sam is down, than Emam is either dead or gone.

Dean grabs on to the fabric under his fingers and throws a punch with his other hand. Under his knuckles, he can feel a shoulder blade and cotton. His mind distantly registers the end of the electric sound and Sam’s sigh of relief. Dean doesn’t let go of his prey.

He has lost contact with the wall, but that doesn’t matter now. Just as long as he knows where his opponent is, Dean can fight him.

Taking advantage of the man’s surprise at being hit from behind, Dean grabs hold of his clothes and shoves him in the general direction he remembers leaving the wall. There is a rewarding sound of a face hitting stone and Dean moves in for seconds. He has no way to tell if the first hit was enough to render the man unconscious, but he is determined to keep a hold on the guy until he's sure the threat's neutralized.

Working both hands up the man’s form, Dean quickly finds the back of his thick head of hair, twists for a secure hold and sends the man’s skull colliding with the wall a second time.

The body under Dean’s hands collapses on the floor with a whimper and he can hear the clatter of the plastic gun hitting the boarded ground before the man does.

Dean kneels beside him, one hand keeping contact in case the man decides to stir, the other groping around. He needs to find Sam, he needs to find that damn gun, but Dean’s fingers hit nothing but dust and wood.

“Sam... Sam, you okay?” Dean whispers, hoping that his brother is close enough and conscious enough to answer him. Nothing. “He-man?”

No one answers him and Dean resists the temptation to run his hands through his hair and pull at it. He wants to let go of this guy and search his brother instead; he wants to be sure that there aren’t anymore attackers lying in wait, biding their time to finish him off when he least expects; he wants to see and feel safe enough to tell his heart that it can stop beating like a maniac now.

Dean does the only thing that is in his power to do at the moment.
“Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio, infernalis adversarii, omnis...”

The man beneath his grip moans and shudders and Dean knows that he’s running out of time to finish the exorcism before the demon starts lashing out again. There really is no way to rush Latin, but Dean tries anyway, the ancient words fluently pouring out of his lips like water. He is two lines away from finishing when the man finally stirs and wakes up.

Too late Dean tries to shift his hold from the man’s chest to his arms. The hard shove that sends Dean flying backwards steals the breath from his lungs in one fell swipe.
For a fragment of time, Dean’s feet lose contact with the ground and he is lost in every sense of direction. It’s hard to even tell up from down.

Dean’s back collides painfully with a wall of stone and he slides to the ground in a haze of pain. In between his throbbing body and the darkness, Dean can’t tell where his attacker is anymore. He lost track of everything but the stone at his back and the wood beneath his legs.

He can’t hear the man moving anymore, but something tells Dean that his enemy didn’t just gave up and leave. He is in there somewhere, circling, silent as a ghost.

A hand waves in front of his face and Dean recoils as he feels the air move. The guy’s just there, right beside him one moment, gone the next. And now he knows that he has the advantage of sight over Dean.

A hunter, however, doesn’t need to see the demon to send it packing back to Hell.

Dean swallows down the panic, saves it for later. He uses the wall as a crutch, pushing his rubbery legs into cooperation, forcing his tongue back into the Latin. He is two sentences away and the last words of the exorcism filter through the air with a yelled ‘Gloria Patri’ that multiples and fades away in the deepest corners of the temple in search of a demon to expel back to Hell.

Nothing happens.

There is no scream coming from the possessed man, there is no rushing of wind as the demon leaves, there isn’t even a single hair rising on Dean’s forearms at the static release of evil.

There is a faint gush of air to Dean’s left and he jumps to his feet, turning that way. Silence follows and he can’t hear anything past the beating of his own heart against his eardrums.

A rustle of clothing to the right and Dean throws a punch in that direction. His shoulder hurts when he hits nothing but air. This guy was playing with him, like a lazy cat corralling a blind mouse and Dean’s mouth is as dry as the desert outside.

In the part of his brain that isn’t furiously trying to figure out where his attacker is, Dean is going over the exorcism. Maybe he’d skipped some important word in his rush, maybe he’d mispronounced a couple.

Ever since the fateful event of being trapped in a cellar with a demon and having to rely on a torn up and half buried in rubble book, Dean had taken upon himself to finally sit down and memorize those damn things.

He knew six different exorcisms now... all by heart.

Dean’s sure that he said the right words. He can’t figure where it actually went wrong, or if it even went wrong at all; maybe the reason why the exorcism didn’t work was because there was nothing there to be exorcised in the first place.

The violent jab to his throat comes from neither the left nor the right. It comes from straight ahead and hits Dean like a hammer made of pointy knuckles. For a couple of frightening seconds, Dean can’t breathe, he can’t swallow, he can’t do a damn thing but clasp at his own neck and futilely try to open his airway from the outside in.

Dean stumbles forward; his fall is cut short by the wall that hits him square in the forehead. Throwing his hands front, tips of all digits scrapping raw against rugged stone, Dean allows for the solid construction to ground him against the spinning world.

There is a second punch to his left kidney, fast as lightning, hard as rock. This one brings tears to Dean’s eyes, but the pain is so sharp and overwhelming that his throat opens enough to let out a gasp and allows a breath in.

Dean’s hands reach out as he curls around himself, trying to make himself smaller; trying to stop whatever hit comes next with his stretched hands.

It doesn’t work.

When the fist finds his right kidney next, Dean knows he’ll be pissing blood for at least a week after this. Unable to hold himself up any longer, Dean falls to his knees and wonders why the man doesn’t just finish him off, delivers the final blow.

And that’s when he realizes that he knows exactly where is attacker will hit next.

The pattern isn’t exactly inventive, but it’s effective enough to be well known and used by most hand-to-hand fighters and soldiers around the world. Dean figures this guy must fit in one of those groups.

John taught him and Sam this pattern too, amongst others. Block airway; keep them gasping for air. Quick jabs to both kidneys; send them to their knees. And when they’re in position, single blow to the back of the head; render them unconscious.

Knowledge gives Dean power. He dodges to the left and grabs the wrist of the man who was just about to punch him in the base of the neck. The hunter takes no risks this time.

Dean twists the man’s arm until he hears a snap and when the man voices his pain and its easier to pinpoint where his mouth is, Dean thrusts his legs up, rises and lands an open handed blow on the man’s nose, one that is guaranteed to send bone straight in to brain.

When he lets go, Dean knows it’s a dead weight that hits the ground.

The hand that grabs his shoulder from behind is huge and, still riding the wave of adrenaline and pain, Dean quickly turns around and lets his fist fly aimlessly. There is a small moment of pure content when he feels his knuckles make contact with someone’s face.

“Ow! Geesh, Dean... it’s me! Take it easy,” Sam breathes out, voice gruff and contained.

Dean recoils at the sound, flesh hitting flesh feeling like it’s his own that was hit. His body is humming, eager to dish out the rest of the fighting instinct that’s built up ever since he threw the first blind punch. His mind, however, pulls back with all the breaks on, warning him that the fight is over and he just threw one punch too many. The change from full speed ahead to a complete stop is dizzying.

“Whoa, there... easy,” Sam voices, sounding near and softer. The hand moves from Dean’s shoulder to his forearm, morphing from huge and menacing to warm and protective. “I got you... are you hurt?”

“Sammy? Oh, shit! I’m sorry... are you okay? Where did I hit you?” Dean starts, the words pouring out of his mouth at the same speed his heart is pumping inside his chest. “Who are these people? What the hell happened here?”

There is a click of a flashlight being turned on and for a second Dean wonders if it’s broken, because nothing happens.

Sam’s hand is patting him down as he speaks, as if Dean’s lack of sight translates in a lack of feeling as well. “I don’t know... they were just waiting for us,’ Sam says, two fingers pushing Dean’s hair out of the way. “You’re bleeding.”

Dean scrunches his eyebrows in confusion, the movement awakening the pain in the gash in his forehead. “I’m fine,” he presses on, fumbling to catch Sam’s prodding fingers and stop him. “Were they demons? Did you manage to exorcise any of them? I tried and-“

“They were just human, all of them,” Sam assures him, confirming what Dean already suspected.

“How many?”

Sam takes a couple of seconds to reply. Dean only fought one, but Sam has been talking plural all along, so he figures there’s more.

“Three,” Sam confirms. “I killed one with the knife. There’s another with his neck broke -I think that happened when I was zapped- and the third one... I think you smashed his nose half way into his brain,” Sam relates softly. “They’re all dead.”

Dean sighs, his stomach recoiling from the idea of more blood on his and Sam’s hands. It’s bad enough when they’re forced to kill the most of the humans that demons possess...
“Cas said a demon had him... why are these people fighting for the demon side? It makes no sense,” Dean thinks out loud. Asmodeus, Cas had called him. Were demons recruiting humans from the fringes of society like Zachariah had started doing?

There’s a soft sound of heavy limbs being moved around and muffled noises as Sam shifts something around.

“They have a tattoo,” Sam whispers. Silence follows, more rustling of clothing. The metallic clink of the flashlight being set on the floor. “All three of them have the same tattoo on their wrist.”

“Like the brands on those ghosts that Lilith raised as witness?”

“No, regular tattoos... ink looks old too, like they were made a good few years ago.”

Another pause and Dean can easily imagine his tall brother crouching on the ground; head tilted to the side as he carefully studies the marks on the dead guys.

“What does it look like?”

“Circular... a serpent biting its own tail... and what looks like a pentagram inside,” Sam whispers, voice lost in thought as he tries to figure out the mark. “Some of the elements in it are pretty familiar, but I have no idea what they mean in this context-“

“Cas mentioned a demon named Asmodeus... think that could be his brand? That he somehow recruited these men to do his dirty work for him? Branded them?”

“I don’t know,” Sam says. He sounds as weary and tired as an eighty-year-old man. Dean knows exactly how that feels. “I saw something at the back of the temple... be right back, okay?”

Dean doesn’t bother to answer. Sam wasn’t really looking for approval, his footsteps hurrying away even before he finishes talking.

Reaching out his hand, Dean searches for something solid he can use to guide him to the floor. Now that the adrenaline has finally stopped pumping, his legs are as solid as jello and there’s cold sweat pooling at the base of his neck.

Three men. Three more lives wasted because of a war that half of these people didn’t even know they were fighting. Why? Why were these guys waiting for him? Why hadn’t Cas warned them about this?

At a distance, Dean can hear the sound of a plastic tarp being pushed aside, crackling and crushing like dry leaves. He hopes that Sam doesn’t find any more trouble in wherever he’s going, because Dean really doubts he can move right now.



There’s no one else around. In the gloom of the temple, Sam’s flashlight beam cuts through the darkness like a hot knife through cold butter. Three dead guys, one pasty white brother and a lot of empty space.

Emam is no where to be found and Sam figures that, like he had feared, the older man turned tail and run as soon as he smelled trouble. He probably wasn’t even around long enough to see that these weren’t even demons at all. Just regular humans. Trying to kill them.

The younger Winchester can’t really bring himself to blame the Egyptian. It’s one thing to pay your debts, or at least the ones he thought he owed Bobby. It was another thing to pay them with your life.

But the fact of the matter is, the guys who attacked them, weren’t even trying to kill them. And that just doesn’t fit anywhere in Sam’s logic.
Why would demons, lay a trap for him and Dean, as this one so obviously had been, and send humans to do their work?

And taser guns? Were Lucifer’s orders to not harm his vessel that specific that no lethal weapons were to be used against him? But on the other hand, there was no way these guys could’ve guessed that Dean would be staying outside, which meant that those tasers were meant for Dean as well. Was the plan to capture them both? What for?

Of course, there was another option that Sam’s brain kept pushing that he stubbornly kept refusing to acknowledge.

The only source of information that they have so far that this is the work of demons, are Cas’s appearances in Dean’s dreams. Sam doubts very much that the angel would point his finger at demons unless he was sure of what he was saying and he doubts even more that humans would be able to confuse an angel into misinterpreting such a thing.

Which means that either there were no demons involved and Cas lied about it or there are demons involved and whoever had showed up in Dean’s dream wasn’t Cas at all.

The idea alone sends shivers up Sam’s back. It’s bad enough to have two powerful supernatural beings coveting for their bodies... but to also have their minds assaulted and invaded so callously?

The memory of Lucifer using his memories and Jessica’s image to woo him still left a bad taste in Sam’s mouth whenever his mind betrayed him into remembering that.

The memory, however, serves its purpose whenever it pops up. It reminds Sam why he is fighting, why he can’t stop and give up and just say ‘yes’. As far as he knows, Michael hasn’t used the same trick on Dean, but it’s impossible to be sure.

His hold on the bloody knife grows tighter as Sam moves to the end of the hall.

The faint blue glow that he’s notice before is still shimmering from behind the see-through plastic tarp. Sam’s fingers, coated with first man’s blood, leave a red trail behind when he pushes the tarp aside.

He has no illusions about whether or not he’ll find Cas in there. Demons or no demons, there is no way that they would leave an angel with just three guards. So, it comes as no surprise when the space behind the tarp reveals its emptiness. There’s a battery-operated lamp hanging from above, smashed to pieces, construction materials, some old shoes, a pair of short benches and one discarded work-glove.
The blue glow that had attracted Sam there is coming from a small, silver cased laptop, sitting on top of one of the stools.

Sam blinks against the oddity of such a modern piece of technology lying in the middle of a place that was built centuries before. There is no active screensaver and the only thing on the screen is a grainy photo of Dean. Behind it, Sam can see the edges of another blown up picture. He clicks on it, nothing more than a faint desire to confirm what he already knows that picture will show. It still comes across as a surprise when Sam sees himself on the computer too.
Two badly shot pictures of them, blurry and hardly focused. But there is no mistaking the faces or the place where they were taken.

Sam remembers sitting on that red-wine colored couch, thinking that he wanted nothing more than to sink into its comfortable stuffing and disappear from existence, if only for a little while. He had been waiting for Dean to change into his new clothes, biting on his nails to stop himself from charging into the room where Dean was and offer a helping hand. Apparently, he’d been so preoccupied with everything that was going on that he’d completely missed when someone had taken a photo of him.

Dean’s is slightly more disturbing. He is staring right at the camera, eyes impossibly large and lost. Sam’s sure that Dean had no clue that he was being photographed anymore than he did. Both of them blinded to the reality that someone had been spying on them.

Slapping the laptop closed and holding it under his arm, Sam glances at his watch. Twenty-five minutes have gone by since they came in. They needed to get out of there. Fast.

Sparing one last glance at the empty room and making sure that there is nothing of use left, Sam hurries back to his brother. If the guards were to arrive and find them with three dead bodies... there is not one reasonable explanation for it that Sam can think of, even if he spoke the language.

Dean looks ashen in the flashlight glow. He is sitting down, eyes closed and his back pressed against one of the pillars, neck extended so that his head can take advantage of the stone support. His right foot is barely an inch away from the face of the guy who’s throat Sam slashed and the blood pooling on the floor has already started to soak through Dean’s jeans.

“You okay?” Sam whispers, making sure to make some noise before touching his brother’s shoulder. His jaw is still smarting from the last time he forgot that, for now, Dean can’t see him coming.

Dean blinks sluggishly and looks around. The gash on his forehead has almost stopped bleeding completely, but the dirty red that trickled down his face makes for an ugly contrast in Dean’s skin. When his eyes settle, his brother misses Sam’s position for a whole foot.
“I’m good... what did ya find?” Dean asks the wall.

“Yeah, you look just fine,” Sam mumbles, tugging his brother’s arm up. “Found a computer, maybe we’ll be able to find something about these guys from here. Can you get up? We need to get out of here.”

“Cas? He-man?”

Sam sighs. “I don’t think Cas was ever here,” he shares with Dean. “And Emam-“

“Cut tail and ran?” Dean guesses.

“Looks like it. That or-“ Sam stops himself. The clothes that Dean’s wearing now are exactly the same that he saw in the picture on the laptop. These are new clothes, bought only hours before. The only way anyone could have a picture of Dean that recent was if they’d been inside Emam’s house. Which gives them a really short list of suspects. “Dean, these guys were waiting specifically for us. They had a computer with our pictures, photos taken here, in Egypt,” Sam whispers, even though there is no one there but Dean to hear. “I think they were taken inside Emam’s house.”

“What are you saying? That He-man sold us out? Bobby’s friend?”

Sam runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t know... maybe? It certainly doesn’t look all that good for him--” Sam stops when he feels Dean’s hand on his arm, squeezing hard.

“Sam-Bobby! We left Bobby alone and if this guy is working for the other side...”

Sam swallows the bile that jumps to his mouth. Dean’s right. Bobby trusts this guy and if Emam isn’t with them, odds are he went back to the older hunter. “Come on! Let’s go!”

They don’t get far, though. The guard is already outside.

There is a beam of a flashlight dancing on the ground, beyond the entrance of the temple, and they can hear the bark of the guard’s dog from above.

Sam kills his own light, hoping that he isn’t too late, and grabs Dean, holding a hand over his brother’s mouth. There is no time to warn him about the why, but Sam knows his brother can guess what is happening when he relaxes under Sam’s touch and nods.

They press themselves against the thick walls of the doorway and wait.

For a couple of long minutes, there is no other sound other than their soft breathing and the beating of their hearts as Sam and Dean wait for the guard to finish his round from above and go about his business.

With every second that trickles by, they know that Bobby is alone and might need them. If Emam was the one who betrayed them; if he went back to Bobby; if Bobby was a target just like them... the time that they are wasting, cowering against a doorway, might cost the older man his life.

One more minute goes by. Two. Sam keeps one hand on Dean’s arm, keeping his brother grounded, keeping him still. He can see by the way Dean’s fingers are nervously clenching at his clothes that he is eager to get moving, to race back to Bobby and make sure that everything is okay. Through Sam’s mind pass the most crazy ideas, as he pictures Dean escaping through his fingers and racing into to the open, only to be shot dead by an over zealous guard with an automatic weapon and a trigger happy finger.

When the powerful light beam disappears and the open space ahead of them is once again plunged back into darkness, Sam sighs in relief and squeezes Dean’s arm reassuringly. It’s time to go.

They have another thirty minutes until the guards on the ground make their rounds. They only need five to make their way back.

The parking lot is empty. The car they arrived in had been the only one there and now all that Sam can see is open ground and date trees.
He says nothing as they make their way to the shop they broke into, already knowing what he’ll find there. Or rather, what he won’t.

“What? What is it? Is Bobby okay?” Dean whispers, his voice barely hiding the panic.

Panic. The feeling grows deep inside Sam’s chest before he can force himself to say the words. He knows the impact they will have on his brother and he can’t think of a single thing to say that will ease that pain.
“He’s gone,” Sam simply says. “They’re both gone.”



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