Requiem for Snow
Title: Requiem for Snow
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: None
Warnings: Violence
Word Count: 9378
Summary: This story follows canon up to Changing Channels - sort of. The January before he went to Hell, Dean and his brother Sam faced the Last Calusa in Key West, Florida. At that time, they knew nothing of the impending Apocalypse, of Lilith's plan for the two of them - but one seemingly unimportant event during that hunt set their destiny on a new path - a path that would not catch up with them until after Lucifer had been freed from his cage. (or you could just think of it as a different sort of daddy!Dean fic)
Summary (This Chapter): Heather knows she didn't imagine what happened at the Babcock house - and she would just like some straight answers. She's not alone - her father, Stephen, is forced to make a painful decision of his own. When the Winchesters get back to South Dakota, they had planned to return to Jasper in a few months - Lucifer has other ideas in that regard.
Notes: This is a modified version of the original chapters of this story. Certain events have changed. This story also uses events in the books Bone Key and Heart of the Dragon - both by Keith RA DeCandido.
When Heather came home from the hospital on Saturday afternoon, it was apparent that the word had gotten out of what had happened. In a town this size, word of mouth was faster than anything else - including the Internet. The answering machine had a grand total of fifty messages - half of them were from the teachers of both Jasper Elementary and Jasper Middle Schools. The other half were from her mom's coworkers and a bunch of kids who she went to school with whom she knew in name but not by sight. She was still groggy, despite the good night's sleep - the doctors had told her that particular problem should be gone by Sunday morning. Being tired Heather could handle - more than anything, she just wanted to shut out what had happened.
Now, her mother could tell her a thousand times that she'd imagined the smoke monster that had come out of Mr. Babcock and maybe, at the one-thousandth and first time she might believe her. But what she couldn't deny was the fact that she looked like one of the two men who'd come into the house. That was, in a word, plain as the nose on her face. Sarah and Stephen Kittredge had never hidden the fact that their daughter was adopted and even though she'd always known it, Heather had never given much thought to her birth parents.
Of course, since the man - what had his name been? She could only vaguely remember the details and that the other one, the tall one - had been named Sam. If she heard the other one's name, she didn't remember it. But he'd taken a look at her and been just as shocked as she was. Had the situation not been so traumatic and horrifying, it might have been funny. But those two men were probably long gone by now - headed home or headed somewhere else. No one at the hospital had gotten their names and no one had seen them before.
Heather curled up in her desk chair, tucking her knees under her chin, wondering just what had been wrong with Mr. Babcock. Molly had said that her parents were being way to nice - had there been something wrong with Mrs. Babcock too? She tapped her fingers on her closed laptop, thinking. Well, the world is full of crazy people. Maybe someone else has seen a smoke monster that wasn't related to Lost - and maybe someone told them they imagined it too - but they didn't. Flipping the computer open, she decided that there wasn't any harm in looking.
*
Three hours later, when her mom called her for dinner, Heather was a little wiser and a great deal more confused. She'd started with possession - and found a few cases of people who claimed they'd been possessed. There was even a girl, a little younger than her from New Harmony, Indiana who claimed she'd been overtaken by a demon who'd murdered her grandparents while in her body. There were also two highly amusing young men who called themselves the 'Ghostfacers' and told her how to kill a ghost via salt and burning. Given that several other sites had mentioned salt as a protectorate from evil, that might explain why the smoke came out of Mr. Babcock when Beth hit him with the fishbowl.
She came downstairs and slid into her chair in the kitchen, not feeling much like eating, but knowing better than to try and avoid it. The fresh smell of oregano and basil seeped from under the covered pot as her mom set down a basket full of bread and then sat down across from her as her father shut the book he was reading and then they said grace.
“I have to go to Bloomington this Monday.” Stephen said as he put some salad on his plate. “That lecture I said I would do for the education majors up at Indiana University.” He passed the salad bowl to Heather. “I should be back for dinner.” He took a deep breath. “Your nights didn't get changed again, did they Sarah?”
“No.” She smiled as she buttered her bread. “I should be home at five.” She turned to Heather. “So don't forget your keys on Monday.”
Heather, who'd been poking at her salad looked up. “I don't know if I want to go to school on Monday.”
“I don't know if leaving you here alone is the best idea...”
“I can watch myself. I'm thirteen.” She swallowed. “I... I just don't want to go to school... I mean...”
“Sarah, it's perfectly understandable. I'll talk to Lydia Craig. I seriously doubt she's going to hold it against Heather if she doesn't want to go to school Monday, or even the rest of the week.”
“I'll do my homework... I just... I just don't to go and have to answer questions... not yet, anyway.”
“Eat your dinner, baby girl.” Sarah gave her a hint of a smile. “We'll see, okay?”
“Sure mom.” She speared a chunk of lettuce on her fork and started to eat.
*
Stephen Kittredge had believed his daughter when she had said that black smoke had poured out of Nicholas Babcock. Twelve years ago, he'd seen it come out of someone himself... when John Winchester paid a visit to Indianapolis. Sarah had never known about the man's visit - she had gone to a librarian's conference in Florida. Heather, of course, at fourteen months, had been to young to remember the visit. It had been obvious to both men from almost the very start. John, of course, didn't want to go into details and had decided to let the subject of how exactly it was possible take a back seat from the case he'd been working on. He was still pursuing the monster that had killed Mary at the time.
The last time he had heard from John Winchester was in two-thousand five, when he called from somewhere in the west, and the conversation had lasted exactly two minutes. In the first minute, he informed his old friend from the Marines to keep Heather safe - and in the second, he gave Stephen a phone number and told him that if anything 'odd' happened around her, to call him at once. That had been four years ago and Stephen knew that most people didn't keep their cell phone numbers that long.
He had noticed the two men sitting outside Heather's room at the hospital yesterday. He had recognized them as John's boys, despite the fact that he'd only seen either of them in pictures - well, he'd met Dean, but that was nearly thirty years ago. He flipped through his address book as he sat in his office in the basement. With the door shut, he knew that Sarah wouldn't be disturbing him and he could hear his daughter moving around in her room above him. Hell, it was worth a shot if seeing the number still worked.
“I should have called him when Ava disappeared...” He muttered as he punched the buttons on his own cell. He and John were as unlikely a pair of men as possible. They'd met in basic training years ago, John joined the Marines for the fact he didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting into college - or being able to afford it. Stephen had joined due to a feeling of duty - and to avoid being drafted into a less favorable position in the Marines - he'd ended up flying helicopter ambulances. John was from Lawrence, Kansas and he was from Paducah, Kentucky. In another lifetime, they would have met as opponents on a football or basketball team - not as fellow soldiers. The phone rang once, twice, three times and then, between the fourth and fifth ring, it finally picked up.
“Hello?”
“Hello, John, it's Stephen Kittredge.”
“I'm afraid John can't come to the phone right now.”
“Do you know when he will be available? This is rather important.”
“I hate to be the one to tell you this, but John Winchester died four years ago.”
Stephen cursed under his breath. “Who is this, then?”
“This is his son, Dean. How the hell did you know my father?”
“That's a very long story.”
Seven miles away, Dean frowned. This was an unexpected development in the situation. He pulled his father's journal towards him and flipped through it, on instinct, to November of nineteen ninety-seven. A page had been torn out. “I take you don't want to give me any answers over the phone.”
“That would probably be for the best.” Stephen's voice was flat.
“I'm going to give you an address. Be there in one hour.”
*
“Are you sure about this Dean?” Sam said for the third time in thirty minutes.
“The page before the missing one in dad's journal says he was going to see an old friend from his days in the Marines while he was in Indianapolis. I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that Kittredge is the person in question.”
“But if that's the case, then dad would have known about Heather.”
“Thus explaining the missing page.” Dean said, with a wry smile. “I think Bobby's in a good mood finally... he chewed me out for about twenty minutes this morning.”
“Well, in your defense, I think you were really, really drunk that night in Key West.”
“Considering how many spirits I had coursing through me for the first part of the night, I felt it was required.”
“No arguments there.” Sam replied as there was a knock on the door. “I was hoping Cas would be back by now.”
“Maybe he got a lead on God while he was out.” Dean replied as Sam checked the peephole before opening the door.
*
Hours later, Dean stared at the ceiling of the hotel room, willing himself to fall asleep and finding it next to impossible. Tomorrow, he and Sam would leave Jasper and head south, aiming for Nashville. They would then circle back north, heading for Bloomington, Indiana. On Monday morning, at exactly nine thirty, they were expected to be at a small roadside park halfway between here and there. Stephen Kittredge would meet them there - and then, they would leave for South Dakota, taking Heather with them. When he got home from Bloomington, Mr. Kittredge would explain things to his wife - and then they would act as if Heather had run away. Since they'd have at least a seven hour head start, the Winchesters would be somewhere in Iowa by then.
It wouldn't be permanent, that was made very clear. As soon as the worst of the danger was over, Heather was to come back home. In Dean's mind, that meant when Lucifer was back where he belonged. If things started to go their way, for example, they actually found the Colt - then this whole thing could be over by Christmas. He wasn't planning on it, but hell, he'd have Heather back to her parents by the time she turned fourteen at the latest. Granted, he knew that Bobby wouldn't be to pleased to have a house-guest for that time, but hell... wasn't he constantly talking about how family didn't end with blood?
**
Dawn was just breaking over the vast cemetery in Normandy. The white cairns stretched outward, a stark contrast to the brown grass that heralded the long winter. In the stillness, a lone figure walked, past stones engraved with names and a myriad of birth dates. But for many of them, these sons slain so far from home, the date of death was the same: June fourth, nineteen forty-four. Near the end of a row, the figure crouched down and set her hand against the stone. Where this man still alive, today he would be eighty four years old. A tear slid down the figure's cheek as she set a small bundle of bluebells at the marker.
“Did I ever tell you what a nice name you have? Nathaniel. I do hope someone explained to you why I left you there, with your parents. You were a very pretty baby.” She slowly turned her head as she felt someone approaching. “Why are you following me?” She stood up.
Castiel said nothing for a moment. He looked from her to the tombstone and then back, understanding instantly. “I'm sorry.”
“I never did get to see him all grown up... I've not seen him since the day he was born.” Polyhymnia did her best to remain calm. “I'll ask you again, why are you following me?”
The angel stuffed his hands into the pockets of his coat, wincing ever so slightly at the cold. “I need your help.”
“If you're referring to the situation in Indiana, I believe that's been handled.”
“It's not that. The Winchesters don't need your help... I need your help.”
“Help with what, exactly? You might currently be an angel in rebellion, but you're still an angel, Castiel. I'm just about a step above the majority of all the pagan scum. Your kind doesn't like me or my sisters. I also know that if you are ever issued the order to find a way to get rid of us, I'm first on the list for execution. I don't know how I can possibly help you, unless you want me to find you a choir to hide in, or something.”
He took a step towards her. “No. It is not that.” A part of him absolutely hated that he was doing this, another part was partially relieved and the remaining part of him was angry that he even had to do this. “I need your help in finding God.”
Polly blinked at him, surprised. “I thought all of you angels knew where He was. I thought He was in your paradise.”
“Others have told me different. I need to find Him so that Lucifer can be stopped before it's to late.”
“And you think I know where He is why?”
“I know you don't know where He is.” He swallowed once before continuing. “But I can not do this alone and I do not have anyone else I can ask.”
“If I do this, we will both be in a considerable amount of trouble when it is over.” She turned away form the grave and came towards him. “If we fail at this, you'll be sent into the Great Oblivion and I'll be in chains for several hundred years.” She shook her head. “Even if we succeed, I'll be put in chains anyway. This sort of... fraternization is about as forbidden as it gets.” She took a deep breath and then looked up at him. “I will still need to take care of my other obligations.”
“As will I.” Castiel blinked as it started to snow. “So you will do it?”
“Well, as a wise man once said, there are things worth dying for. I'd say helping save the world is at the top of the list.” The corners of her mouth lifted slightly. “I'd also say this is worth the amount of trouble I'll get into for doing it.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “My only question is, where do you want to start?”
“With a thank you.” The angel held out his hand which she took. He could see the faint scars on both of her cheeks from the last time she had been kept in chains, four hundred years ago. That was one other thing he remembered about the Muses. None of them, not a single one of them when they were bound in chains that burned with holy fire did they scream. They withstood that pain without a word.
“You're welcome.” Polly responded as she squeezed his hand with hers.
**
The demon slipped through shadows, flying on her new mission. While she was determined that it would be easy, so very easy, she refused to let her guard down. The house was pathetically easy to slip into. She shied away from the crucifix and holy water font at the foot of the stairs. She could avoid that easily - there was only one other one, and that hung in Heather Kittredge's room. She slid under the doorway of the master bedroom and to the right side of the bed.
Sarah Kittredge was deep in slumber as the demon slid into her body. She felt the woman panic for the briefest of moments before the demon started filling through her thoughts, her memory, everything. Stockpiling facts and gathering mannerisms until the demon was almost fully integrated with her. Only then the demon settle down, shoving the true Sarah Kittredge into the back of her own mind. The demon woke for a moment to glance at the clock. It was just after one in the morning. She pulled the warm blankets under her chin and she snuggled her face into the pillow. This bed was far more comfortable than the one at the Babcock's home.
She just had to wait a few days, that was all.
**
Sunday was blessedly uneventful, after the last two days, the less complication the better. The only thing that varied from the norm in the Kittredge family was that Sarah stated she was suffering from a migraine and didn't go to church with her husband and daughter. This wasn't the first time it'd happened, so Stephen thought nothing of it. He tried not think about how this Christmas would be during the homily when the priest was talking about Advent being a season of preparation and joy. There'd be a family member missing - unless a miracle occurred. He had resigned himself that this was for the best and he and his wife's sorrow was worth their little girl being safe.
Monday morning, however, was hectic as it always was. Even though she adamantly refused to go to school today, Heather came downstairs at six thirty for her morning glass of juice and turned the coffee pot on for her parents. She had a feeling that Beth wasn't going to be going to school either... and it would be nice to get together with her and just... talk, or something. Of course, Molly and Lila had been friends with Beth since they were all in preschool, so she wouldn't be surprised if took her more than a few days before she wanted to speak to anyone. That was okay with Heather, she didn't want to push.
“Morning.” Sarah came into the kitchen, rubbing her eyes. “Are you sure you'll be okay here by yourself?”
“I'll be fine, mom. Is there anything I can do for you?” She bit her lip. “I don't know... clean the bathroom or something?”
The demon was almost laughing at how easy she was fooling this girl. “If you want to, sweetie.” She paused. “Could you dust and vacuum the front room, we might get the Christmas decorations out this week.”
“We don't have a tree yet, mom. We gave ours to the Saint John's rummage sale before we moved.”
“Maybe we can convince your father to get a real tree this year. Wouldn't that be nice?”
“I guess...I'll clean up the room.” She refilled her glass and went back upstairs. “What is in that medication for her migraines...”
Sarah poured herself a cup of coffee as a thump sounded on the porch as the paper arrived. “Oh why don't you stay home tomorrow too, little girl... you and mommy can go say you're going to get a tree... and daddy will come home to an empty house.” She took a big gulp of the scalding hot coffee, delighting in the burn down her throat.
**
Wesley hugged his bag to him as his dad maneuvered their sedan down their driveway and onto the street. It'd been a few days since he'd seen the person in the hallway - and even now he wasn't entirely convinced if it had been a dream or not. He knew, at ten years of age, he was far to big to be making up stories. He sighed. “Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“How old is our house?” He asked as his dad slowed at a stop sign.
“It's pretty old...” He thought for a moment. “I think it was built before the War of Eighteen Twelve. Why you ask?”
“I was just wondering... that's all.”
Wesley's father frowned. “Did you notice something wrong in the house?”
“No... no...” He sighed. “Well, could our house be haunted?”
“If we have a ghost in the house, I've never seen it... why do you think there is one?”
“I... I sort of saw someone in the hallway.. it was right after Thanksgiving... and he vanished into thin air.”
Noah, Wesley's father, chuckled. “I think you might have had a little to much to eat... you were probably dreaming.”
“Yeah... probably.” He sighed as his father turned into the circle drive of his school. “There's no such things as ghosts, right?”
“The general consensus on that is no, but it's yet to be completely proven one way or another.” He gave his son a cheerful smile as he stopped the car. “If we have a ghost, that could explain all our missing socks in the laundry.”
“I think the missing socks were turned to dryer lint.” He unfastened his seat belt. “I'll see you later dad.”
“Have a good day, son.”
He opened the door. “I'll try.” He shouldered his bag and headed into school.
**
In keeping with routine, the demon took a shower, got dressed and packed herself a small lunch of leftover pasta before leaving for work. As she shrugged into her coat, she saw Stephen come down to the kitchen for his second cup of coffee. “Now, what time did you say you'd be back from Bloomington?”
He set his coat on one of the chair-backs and then his briefcase in the seat. “No later than five-thirty. I'll call if I'm going to be late.” He came over and kissed her on the cheek. “Have a good day.”
“You too.” She smiled and picked up her purse and keys. “Anything in particular you want for dinner?”
“Oh, just about anything is good. After a lunch provided by campus dining, I'd probably be happy with peanut butter and jelly.” They both laughed as Sarah put on her coat.
“I'll see you tonight.” She went into the garage and a moment later, Stephen heard the door open, the car start up and pull away. After he heard the door close again, he walked to the front room and watched the car drive away. He then put his coffee mug down and went upstairs. He knocked once on Heather's door before opening it.
“Dad?” Heather looked up from the book she was reading. “What's wrong?”
“Do you know where your duffel bag is? The big green one you packed last May?”
“Yeah, it's in my closet, why?”
“I want you to get it out, pack as many of your clothes into it as you possibly can.”
“What's going on?”
“Just do it. Quickly.”
“O...Okay...” She got up and went to her closet and pulled the bag down from her shelf and opened her dresser and started to empty it of it's contents. Heather was worried. Her dad had never acted like this that she could remember. She heard him go downstairs into the basement but she kept packing, going into the bathroom to get things like her toothbrush and other items. “Please don't be sending me to Aunt Shelly's house.” She zipped the full bag closed, glancing once into her closet to see that she'd left most of her skirts and dresses hanging up. After emptying her backpack of her schoolbooks, she put her laptop, her I-pod, its charger, a sketchbook, a battered teddy bear she'd had forever and her autographed copy of D.J. MacHale's Raven Rise. She was wondering if there was anything else she should pack when her father came back into the room and handed her two items. One was her passport and the other was a thick white envelope. She recognized it at once. “This is the emergency fund.”
“This is an emergency. Put those in your backpack. I'll explain in the car.” He turned the light out in her room, picked up her bag and went downstairs.
Heather did as asked, adding the snapshot of her and her parents and her wallet to the bag before following her dad, stopping in the downstairs hallway to get her coat. She frowned when she passed the stairs - he'd turned the TV on and the second disc in the Return of the King box set was playing.
“Hurry.” Stephen took the backpack and put it into the trunk of his car. “Don't open the door.”
“Daddy, you're scaring me.” Heather stood on the step leading down to the garage, noting that her father looked nervous.
“Get in the backseat and sit on the floor. Please.”
Part of her wanted to demand an answer, but the look on the man's face was enough for her to know that now was not the time to be obstinate. She did as asked and as she shut the door, she heard the garage door opening.
Stephen got into the car and glanced back at her. “I love you baby girl, you know that, right?”
“Yes, dad. I love you too.” She swallowed. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No, Heather, you didn't.” He started the car up and they pulled away from the house. “A long time ago, back when I was in basic training in the Marines, I met a man named John Winchester. He was from Kansas and he was a pretty decent guy. We went to Vietnam together and when that was over, he went home to Lawrence and I went to school in Lexington.” He took a breath. “Anyway, I finished school and started working in Louisville and he kept in the family business of auto mechanics.”
“You met mom in Louisville.”
“That's right. Well, John eventually married a woman named Mary and they had two kids, Dean and Sam. Well, when Sam was six months old, there was a fire at their house and Mary died.”
“That's awful.” She rubbed her nose and reached over to get a Kleenex from the box on the floor behind the driver's seat.
“Yeah, it was. Well, after that John sort of went off the deep end. He was convinced that it wasn't the fire that killed her, but something else. So he spent the rest of his life traveling across the country, trying to find out what killed her.” He shook his head. “I thought he was crazy at first.”
“Did he find it?”
“Yeah... yeah he did. And in the end, the same thing killed him.” He sighed. “You don't remember this, but back when you were just a year old, John came to see us in Indianapolis. He's the one who gave you that bear you're so damn fond of.”
“Mom knows him?”
“She didn't know about the visit, she was in Florida for one of those conferences she goes to.” He took the turn onto the rural highway a little slower than he normally would have. “A demon killed Mary and John Winchester. This particular demon is dead, but there's still more out there.”
“Like the one that killed Lila and Molly?” She bit her lip. “That's what killed them, right?”
“Yes. Remember those two men who found you and Beth?”
“Uh huh.” That was a clear understatement. As muddled as that night seemed, she could remember the two men clearly - well, one of them at least.
“Well, those were the Winchester brothers - Sam and Dean. Now, they can explain these things better than I can, because my knowledge of this world is limited.”
A cold feeling of dread sank into Heather's stomach. “Daddy, where are we going?”
“I'm going to Bloomington.” He swallowed hard. “You're going with the Winchesters.”
“Why?”
“Because they can keep you safer than I can.”
“Is this because one of them looks like me?”
“Dean will explain that to you. He's the one you look like.” Stephen kept his eyes straight ahead. A truck passed by them going the other direction. “When the danger's over, they'll bring you home. Which I'm hoping is sooner than later.”
“Why can't we all go?” She knew she was probably pushing his temper asking this many questions, but at this point, she was starting to panic.
“I think the demons are a little more interested in you than they are with your mom and me.”
“Does mom know you're doing this?” She replied with a sob.
“No. I'll explain it to her when I get home.” Stephen's grip on the steering wheel was white. Doing this was so much harder than it had been talking about it. He couldn't fathom what Sarah's reaction would be when he told her.
“Dad, you'll get in trouble... I'll get in trouble...” She swallowed. “What if mom...”
“We're going to tell people you ran away.” He broke in. “I don't think we'd have a hard time convincing people of that.”
“The cops will issue one of those Amber Alert things...” Heather's mind was moving quickly. Did her dad really think he could pull this off?
“Do not worry about the repercussions of this. If we're lucky and keep our prayers said, this will be over by Christmas and you can be home for the holidays.” He let out a weak laugh. “You know as well as I do that those alerts don't always work right away. It took them a year to find that Smart girl.”
“I'm scared.” Heather hugged herself, resting her chin on her knees. “Do you trust the Winchesters?”
“I do, sweet pea. You will be fine - and don't worry about your mom and me.” He steered the car off the highway and into a roadside park where Sam and Dean were already waiting. “We're here.”
Heather nodded and pulled herself into the seat and then opened door, wincing as she stretched her legs. She could not believe this was happening. This was all some really crazy dream. Very vivid, very real, very strange dream, and any minute she was going to wake up back in her bed and see that it was three in the morning. But the cold wind against her cheek won the argument that this was real. She followed her dad to the trunk of the car as he opened it and shouldered her backpack and then lifted her duffel from inside.
Stephen took it from her and they walked across the small parking lot away from his late model sedan towards the black Impala. He'd gone into the jungles of Vietnam thinking he wouldn't come back - all of those walks were nothing compared to this. The urge to take his little girl's hand was so strong but he knew that if he did that, he'd turn right around and this would all be for nothing. He noticed that she was doing a pretty good job of holding back tears. “You're early.” Was the only thing he could say when they reached the brothers.
“Didn't want to be late.” Sam said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He was tired from driving all night while Dean had slept. He'd not been afforded the look that his brother had gotten of the girl. He managed a worn smile. “How are you this morning, Heather?”
“Considering the circumstances...” She thought for a moment. “Okay, I guess. I woke up this morning. That's more than a lot of people got to do.”
Dean took the bag from Stephen and put it in the trunk of the Impala. “It's time we were gone, Sammy.”
“Right.” He said in reply.
Stephen gave Heather a bear hug. “I love you, Heather Grace.”
She returned the hug. “I love you too, dad. Give mom a hug for me.”
“I will.” He pulled away and ruffled her hair before walking back to his car.
Dean slammed the trunk closed. “Let's go.”
“Okay.” She managed to squeak out a reply. All she really wanted to was break down and cry. She pulled the heavy back door open and set her bag on the floor behind the passenger seat as she slid in. The car had the distinct smell of leather and something she couldn't place. She saw out of the corner of her eye that her dad's car was already gone.
Dean shut the door behind her before getting into the car. As they pulled out of the park and headed north, he glanced in the rear-view mirror at their backseat passenger. Next to him, Sam yawned and a few minutes later, he was snoring softly. He inwardly cursed, he'd been hoping his brother would stay awake long enough for them to at least get a word or two out of the girl. Well, he sure as hell wasn't going to spend the drive until Sam woke up in total silence. “Ever been to South Dakota?”
“What?” Heather turned from the window.
“You ever been to South Dakota?”
“Yeah... when I was nine and I went on vacation to the Black Hills. Is that where we're going?”
“Not the Black Hills part, but the eastern part of South Dakota.”
“Oh.” She bit her bottom lip. Clearly, Mr. Winchester was having as much trouble trying to talk as she was. “Is that where you and your brother live?”
“A friend of ours lives there.”
“Where do you live, Mr. Winchester?”
“Dean.” He replied.
“What?”
“You can call me Dean. I don't think I've been called Mr. Winchester since I was in high school.” He sighed. “As for where Sam and I live, you're sitting in our home.”
“You live in this car?” Heather asked incredulously.
“Yeah.” He saw the shocked look on her face that slowly turned to something akin to pity.
“I'm sorry.” She really was. She couldn't imagine having to live in a car, ever.
“We're used to it. Our friend Bobby, that's where we're going - he lives in a house though. I guess that's about the second closest thing my brother and I have to a home.”
“So it's sort of like someplace for you to have a mailing address or something?”
“Or something.”
**
Chuck threw his pencil down in annoyance. He'd not written anything like this in a while - probably not since back in the days when he was still getting published and he wrote Heart. Now here he was, writing about the Winchesters with a kid in the backseat of the Impala. Not just any kid, Dean's kid. He wondered offhandedly if this was some kind of cosmic payback for The Kids Are Alright. Clearly, there was a lot more going on in the world than he was privy too - but since he knew that the mother in question was a Greek Muse...
He was about to pick up his pencil again when the doorbell rang. “Please don't let it be Becky, please don't let it be Becky...” He muttered to himself as he made his way to the door. The last thing he needed this morning was that half-crazed fan of his barging in here. He'd had to stuff all of his writing into a safe and keep the thing locked when she came over.
Which was starting to happen more and more often and becoming borderline scary. The trouble was he was to attached to the house to move, not to mention he couldn't afford it. He peered out the glass and saw a man, older than him, standing there. He opened the door slowly and blinked at the man who was wearing dark sunglasses. “Can I help you?”
“I believe you have some questions that need answering.”
“If you're one of those Jehovah Witnesses, I'm not interested...” He started to close the door when the man reached out and grabbed it, holding it open. “Who the hell are you?”
“I think you already know.” With his free hand, he lowered his sunglasses and grinned. “What was it you called me? Oh yes.. The Trickster.”
Realization dawned on Chuck's face and he stepped aside to let Gabriel in. In his mind, he was glad that he'd actually rang the bell, and not just burst into his house the way so many other angels had.
**
Sam woke up about four hours into the trip, when they stopped for gas. He noted that there was an uncomfortable silence in the car and he couldn't say he was surprised. “Where are we?” He asked tiredly.
“Mount Sterling.” Heather replied as they pulled into the gas station.
He looked at his watch. “This can't be right...”
“You remember to set your watch back an hour for the time zone?” Dean answered.
“Not enough sleep...” He said grouchily and rubbed his face. “Say Heather, you mind switching seats with me?”
She nodded. “Uh, okay.”
“Probably sleep better in the backseat....” He muttered to himself as he got out of the car.
Heather didn't say anything as they switched, she put her backpack in the front seat and then went into the convenience store to use the facilities. The past four hours had been extremely long - she was still in shock and she wagered Dean couldn't think of anything to talk about with her. Around one hour into the four, he'd told her to get the atlas and start checking for highways for him. That had at least been something to do. Why they couldn't just get onto an Interstate and not take the confusing state highways made no sense to her. Then again, nothing about today had made any sense.
Sam had settled into the back seat, glad to be able to stretch out a bit. He'd spent almost all last night driving back to Indiana from Nashville - he and Dean had stayed in town down there long enough to have the first decent meal they'd had since Thanksgiving. He heard the door open and then heard it slam shut. “Door's pretty heavy, isn't it?”
“Yeah.” Heather replied. “How old is this car anyway?”
“It was made in sixty-seven.”
“It still works?”
Sam was glad Dean wasn't in the car to hear that or his chuckle. “It's been well taken care of.”
“I shouldn't say anything... there's an eight-track player in the basement at my house. I took it to school one time and only two kids in my class knew what it was.”
He laughed in reply. “Sometimes I'm surprised this car doesn't play eight tracks...” He yawned again and closed his eyes.
“I'll let you sleep.”
Dean got into the driver's side. “You didn't need anything, did you?”
“No, thank you.”
“Right.” He started up the car and they pulled away. “We have to figure out something to talk about, this silence thing is killing me.”
“Okay.” She answered. “But I'm not playing any stupid road trip games.”
“Anyone who plays road trip games in this car has to get out and walk.”
“Does that include playing a game by yourself?”
“I don't think anyone ever has.” Sam said sleepily from the backseat.
“You seen any good movies lately?” Dean knew it was a lame question as soon as he asked it, but it was about the best he could think of at the spur of the moment.
“I've not really gone to any movies lately.... I think the last one I went and saw was Half Blood Prince.”
“What, you haven't seen New Moon?” He said with a laugh.
“I wouldn't go see that movie unless I was paid too. I hate that series.” She said in disgust. “My English teacher told us in the second quarter that we weren't allowed to do any book reports on any book in the series.” She shook her head. “Half the girls in my class freaked and said that was unfair.”
“What'd you say?”
“I said it was a good idea and that they should stop reading crap.”
“Sam, remind me that Heather here gets the extra cookie next time we have a package of them.”
“Okay.” He muttered before he started snoring again.
**
When Stephen pulled into the garage that evening, he was actually surprised he'd maintained a calm demeanor all day. He took a deep breath as he got out of the car, walked past Sarah's and shut the garage door. This was the one part of the day that was going to be the hardest - telling his wife where their little girl went. Steeling himself up to act as if everything was perfectly normal, he opened the door and went inside. “I'm home.” No sooner had he shut the door then he found himself slammed against it.
“Where is she?” A voice snarled at him. It sounded like Sarah, but as he stared at the woman holding him against the door, he knew it couldn't be her. There was no way in hell that a five foot two woman who weighed one-fifty could hold his six foot three one hundred and ninety pound body pinned to a wall.
“What?” He managed to gasp out and then he saw her eyes - Sarah's eyes were solid black. “Who...” He struggled to break free. “Where's Sarah?”
“Oh she's here.” The demon tapped her free hand against her head. “She's in here, watching Stephen. When we came home and found this house empty, she sure was happy about it. Too happy for my taste...now where is Heather?”
“I don't...”
“Liar.” She backed away and flexed her hand, keeping him pinned to the wall with her powers. “You sent her away. You foolish, foolish man...”
“Get out.”
“No.” She smiled, her eyes still solid black. “I know what you did. You sent her off with the Winchesters.”
Stephen knew that the shock on his face gave him away. “Leave her alone.”
“Oh, afraid it's to late for that. My father wants to see her - and he'll find her. She can't hide from him.”
“Don't be so sure of that.” He wheezed as he felt something in his chest tighten.
“You're an old man, Stephen Kittredge. You also wouldn't hurt me because you'd be afraid of hurting your wife.” She backed away from him a little further smiling. “I'm going to kill you... and she's going to watch me do it. It's a pity she's not so young...” She giggled, the noise sounding odd coming from a fifty year old woman. “I do look forward to her explaining how she didn't do it. Who's going to believe her if she said she was possessed?” She pulled her powers back and let him fall to the ground. “Now...” She was cut off as Stephen charged, shoving her into the china cabinet.
Stephen raced into the family room heading for the stairs as he heard the sound of shattering plates and glass rain down behind him. He didn't know how save his wife, hell, he didn't know how he was going to save himself. He couldn't bring himself to leave Sarah alone. He'd almost reached the stairs when the demon tackled him from behind.
“Big mistake.” She snarled and rolled him over.
Reaching blindly upward, Stephen grabbed the holy water font at the foot of the stairs and ripped it from the wall, arching it towards the woman. Sarah, I'm so sorry, Sarah... The plaster shattered against her head and she bellowed in pain. Not so much from the impact, but from the contents of the font. It'd not been much, but it was enough that she'd backed up and was trying to rub the substance away from her. Realization hit him and he took advantage of her distraction to race up the stairs and into the master bedroom. He grabbed the plastic bottle off of his dresser just as the demon charged into the room, blood streaming down the side of her face.
“Bastard.” She gasped from the doorway.
“Go to Hell.” He unscrewed the cap as she charged at him and just before she made impact, he upended the bottle of holy water on her.
The demon screamed in agony as the water gushed down her face, burning her. The more it poured into her, the more it stung. It became unbearable as some of it fell into her mouth and then she roared in defeat.
Stephen watched as black smoke poured out of Sarah's mouth and eyes, howling towards the ceiling before shooting underneath the small gap under the window and outside. He dropped the bottle on the floor just as his wife slumped the ground. “Sarah...” He went and rolled her over. “I'm sorry...”
“I'm okay.” She let out a blubbery cough. “It was awful... she... she...”
“Ssh..” He kissed her forehead and cradled him to her. “You're safe now.”
“I guess there are such things as smoke monsters...” She closed her eyes. “I'm so tired...”
He slid his hand down her back, checking for injuries from where she'd hit the cabinet. Thankfully, nothing seemed to be broken. “I'm sorry.” He said again.
“I was glad to find Heather gone, Stephen.” She said weakly.
“Honey, are you okay?”
“I think it's my insulin.” She winced.
“I'm going to go get you some juice.” He set her against the bedstead, kissing her cheek. “Just hang on.” He turned and ran for the kitchen. When he came back, he helped her drink. “Don't you worry. I'll take care of things.”
Sarah took another sip of the drink, feeling her body slowly start to calm down. “Heather's safe, isn't she?”
“Very safe.” He held the glass for her and kissed her forehead. “You can rest if you like. I'll clean things up and then I guess I better call the cops and tell them our little girl has run away.”
She managed a weak laugh. “How did she get out of Jasper?”
“No idea. You want something to eat?”
“No... not yet.” She took the glass from him and took a drink on her own. “I just want to sit here for a bit.”
“Sure.” He stood up and retrieved a towel from the bathroom and pressed it against the side of her head. He glanced at the empty bottle. “Guess it's a good thing I filled that up when we were at church yesterday.”
“I'm just glad you found something to get that... thing out of me.” She took another sip of juice.
He finished cleaning the side of her face. Thankfully, there was just a tiny cut on her forehead. “You need something more to drink?”
“No.” She smiled. “I'm going to sit here a while, though.”
“Okay.” He pulled the cloth away and stood. “I'll go clean things up and then we'll do what we need to.”
She nodded in reply, still holding onto her glass.
Stephen tossed the bloodstained towel into the laundry hamper and went downstairs. The damage to the cabinet was negligible - the dishes had taken the worst of it. “Guess this answers the question of what Sarah's getting for Christmas.” He got the trash can and started tossing the broken plates into it. Those that were just chipped slightly he set on the dinning room table. After he was finished, he took the back to the large trash can in the garage. When he went downstairs to retrieve the vacuum, however, he stopped short. Someone was sitting in the large easy chair, flipping through one of the photograph albums.
“Hello, Stephen.” The voice was eerily placid.
“Who?” He found himself staring at a man who looked to be in his mid thirties - but he looked - wrong, somehow. Faint blisters were apparent on his forehead, as if the body was trying to hold something in and almost failing.
“I'm going to have to give this girl's mother credit, she did a lovely job of hiding her.” He looked up then and he smiled as he saw the older man falter a bit. “But of course, you already know about Heather.”
“Who are you?” He backed towards the stairs, hoping to run upstairs, grab Sarah and get out of the house.
“You thought you could outsmart me.” He shook his head. “Now, this is just going to be so much more complicated...”
“What's going to be complicated?” He was nearly at the stairs when the other man stood, setting the album down.
“I didn't want to have to come down here to do this myself... but as they say, sometimes if you want something done, you're going to have to do it yourself.” He gave a gesture with his hand and Stephen was hurled upward, onto the ceiling. “Did you know that this is how Mary Winchester died?” He looked up at him, smiling. “I was kind enough to knock your wife unconscious while you were busy with that mess in the other room. So her death should be relatively painless.”
Stephen winced in pain as he was pinned to the ceiling and then he realized exactly who this person was. “Go to Hell.” It was a weak attack, he knew - but a small part of him felt satisfied.
“I don't think so.” Lucifer replied and walked up the stairs. He looked around once and then back at the struggling man in the basement. “I'll find your little girl... one way or another.” He spat on the floor. In that instant, Stephen Kittredge burst into flames. The fallen angel didn't stay to watch. He vanished from the house as the fire spread across the ceiling and up the stairs, racing towards the master bedroom where Sarah lay motionless.
*
It was just after ten when the Impala pulled into the Singer Salvage Yard. All three of the occupants were tired, even Sam, who'd slept half the way there. It was still cold, but thankfully some of the snow from Thanksgiving had melted away. Heather was probably the most tired of the three - to much had happened today and all she wanted to do was sleep. She shivered slightly in her coat as they got out of the car and they all got their duffel bags from the trunk.
Bobby, who'd been watching from the window, wheeled himself over to the door and opened it. “Get in here before you all freeze, ya idjits.”
“Hey Bobby.” Sam said as they came into the house.
“Heard from Jo and Ellen.” Was the old hunter's reply. “I've spared Dean the long story and told them everything.” He looked pointedly at Heather, who had come in last and was shutting the door. “So they're heading back here as soon as they finish up in New Orleans.”
*
Heather looked around the small room she'd been told to go up to and 'get settled' or something like that. This was the first room, other than the kitchen, she'd seen in this house that wasn't packed full of books. Not that she minded the thing about books. Perhaps Mr. Singer would let her read some of them while she was here. The room had no closet, just a dresser that was in desperate need of dusting. “Looks like I'm cleaning tomorrow.” She set her bag on the floor and her backpack on the surface of the dresser. The lone window looked out over the front of the house, although she couldn't see much in the dark, other than the Impala just partially bathed in the glow from the front porch light.
“It could be worse.” She told herself quietly as she opened her backpack and took out the photograph and stuck it in the corner of the dresser mirror. “I don't think they'd object if I went to bed.”
*
Dean woke with a small start shortly after midnight. He looked up from the couch he was sleeping on and looked blearily into the kitchen. Castiel was standing there, leaning against the sink. Rubbing his face, he got up and staggered into the other room, yawning. The sooner he talked to the angel, the sooner he could go back to sleep. He'd already told the angel about personal space - he wondered if he could get the concept of 'ungodly hours of the night' into his mind as well.
“She's here, isn't she?” Castiel looked away from him, his gaze focused on the empty stairs.
“Heather you mean? Yeah, she's asleep upstairs.” He frowned, wondering how the angel couldn't sense her presence.
The angel looked down for a moment and then looked Dean straight in the eye. “Sarah and Stephen Kittredge are dead.”
“What?” He suddenly felt very cold. He'd not told Heather about their relationship - now, on top of that he was going to have to tell her that her parents were gone? “How?”
“Lucifer.” He turned away from him again. “Polyhymnia is taking care of the details of concerning the whereabouts of Heather.” He tilted his head. “She said as one of the inventors of bullshit, she said it would be no problem.”
“Is that what she said?”
“That is exactly what she said.”
Had the situation not been so tragic, Dean might have laughed at that. He ran a hand down his face. “Damn it...” He rubbed his eyes. “I'm not waking her up to tell her all this. She should have at least one last night of uninterrupted sleep.”
*
Castiel left shortly after that, but before returning to the couch, Dean went upstairs and peered into the room Heather was sleeping in. On the bedside table, her I-Pod glowed faintly as the strains of Jefferson Airplane's 'Long John Silver' came from the headphones. He went over and glanced at the device and cracked a small smile when he saw the title of the playlist: Songs I'm Not Supposed to Like.
He turned and walked out of the room, shutting the door quietly. Yesterday had been rough - today, however, was going to be pure emotional hell. For him and for Heather.
In spite of himself, he had to wonder what else was on that playlist.
Chapter Five
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: None
Warnings: Violence
Word Count: 9378
Summary: This story follows canon up to Changing Channels - sort of. The January before he went to Hell, Dean and his brother Sam faced the Last Calusa in Key West, Florida. At that time, they knew nothing of the impending Apocalypse, of Lilith's plan for the two of them - but one seemingly unimportant event during that hunt set their destiny on a new path - a path that would not catch up with them until after Lucifer had been freed from his cage. (or you could just think of it as a different sort of daddy!Dean fic)
Summary (This Chapter): Heather knows she didn't imagine what happened at the Babcock house - and she would just like some straight answers. She's not alone - her father, Stephen, is forced to make a painful decision of his own. When the Winchesters get back to South Dakota, they had planned to return to Jasper in a few months - Lucifer has other ideas in that regard.
Notes: This is a modified version of the original chapters of this story. Certain events have changed. This story also uses events in the books Bone Key and Heart of the Dragon - both by Keith RA DeCandido.
When Heather came home from the hospital on Saturday afternoon, it was apparent that the word had gotten out of what had happened. In a town this size, word of mouth was faster than anything else - including the Internet. The answering machine had a grand total of fifty messages - half of them were from the teachers of both Jasper Elementary and Jasper Middle Schools. The other half were from her mom's coworkers and a bunch of kids who she went to school with whom she knew in name but not by sight. She was still groggy, despite the good night's sleep - the doctors had told her that particular problem should be gone by Sunday morning. Being tired Heather could handle - more than anything, she just wanted to shut out what had happened.
Now, her mother could tell her a thousand times that she'd imagined the smoke monster that had come out of Mr. Babcock and maybe, at the one-thousandth and first time she might believe her. But what she couldn't deny was the fact that she looked like one of the two men who'd come into the house. That was, in a word, plain as the nose on her face. Sarah and Stephen Kittredge had never hidden the fact that their daughter was adopted and even though she'd always known it, Heather had never given much thought to her birth parents.
Of course, since the man - what had his name been? She could only vaguely remember the details and that the other one, the tall one - had been named Sam. If she heard the other one's name, she didn't remember it. But he'd taken a look at her and been just as shocked as she was. Had the situation not been so traumatic and horrifying, it might have been funny. But those two men were probably long gone by now - headed home or headed somewhere else. No one at the hospital had gotten their names and no one had seen them before.
Heather curled up in her desk chair, tucking her knees under her chin, wondering just what had been wrong with Mr. Babcock. Molly had said that her parents were being way to nice - had there been something wrong with Mrs. Babcock too? She tapped her fingers on her closed laptop, thinking. Well, the world is full of crazy people. Maybe someone else has seen a smoke monster that wasn't related to Lost - and maybe someone told them they imagined it too - but they didn't. Flipping the computer open, she decided that there wasn't any harm in looking.
*
Three hours later, when her mom called her for dinner, Heather was a little wiser and a great deal more confused. She'd started with possession - and found a few cases of people who claimed they'd been possessed. There was even a girl, a little younger than her from New Harmony, Indiana who claimed she'd been overtaken by a demon who'd murdered her grandparents while in her body. There were also two highly amusing young men who called themselves the 'Ghostfacers' and told her how to kill a ghost via salt and burning. Given that several other sites had mentioned salt as a protectorate from evil, that might explain why the smoke came out of Mr. Babcock when Beth hit him with the fishbowl.
She came downstairs and slid into her chair in the kitchen, not feeling much like eating, but knowing better than to try and avoid it. The fresh smell of oregano and basil seeped from under the covered pot as her mom set down a basket full of bread and then sat down across from her as her father shut the book he was reading and then they said grace.
“I have to go to Bloomington this Monday.” Stephen said as he put some salad on his plate. “That lecture I said I would do for the education majors up at Indiana University.” He passed the salad bowl to Heather. “I should be back for dinner.” He took a deep breath. “Your nights didn't get changed again, did they Sarah?”
“No.” She smiled as she buttered her bread. “I should be home at five.” She turned to Heather. “So don't forget your keys on Monday.”
Heather, who'd been poking at her salad looked up. “I don't know if I want to go to school on Monday.”
“I don't know if leaving you here alone is the best idea...”
“I can watch myself. I'm thirteen.” She swallowed. “I... I just don't want to go to school... I mean...”
“Sarah, it's perfectly understandable. I'll talk to Lydia Craig. I seriously doubt she's going to hold it against Heather if she doesn't want to go to school Monday, or even the rest of the week.”
“I'll do my homework... I just... I just don't to go and have to answer questions... not yet, anyway.”
“Eat your dinner, baby girl.” Sarah gave her a hint of a smile. “We'll see, okay?”
“Sure mom.” She speared a chunk of lettuce on her fork and started to eat.
*
Stephen Kittredge had believed his daughter when she had said that black smoke had poured out of Nicholas Babcock. Twelve years ago, he'd seen it come out of someone himself... when John Winchester paid a visit to Indianapolis. Sarah had never known about the man's visit - she had gone to a librarian's conference in Florida. Heather, of course, at fourteen months, had been to young to remember the visit. It had been obvious to both men from almost the very start. John, of course, didn't want to go into details and had decided to let the subject of how exactly it was possible take a back seat from the case he'd been working on. He was still pursuing the monster that had killed Mary at the time.
The last time he had heard from John Winchester was in two-thousand five, when he called from somewhere in the west, and the conversation had lasted exactly two minutes. In the first minute, he informed his old friend from the Marines to keep Heather safe - and in the second, he gave Stephen a phone number and told him that if anything 'odd' happened around her, to call him at once. That had been four years ago and Stephen knew that most people didn't keep their cell phone numbers that long.
He had noticed the two men sitting outside Heather's room at the hospital yesterday. He had recognized them as John's boys, despite the fact that he'd only seen either of them in pictures - well, he'd met Dean, but that was nearly thirty years ago. He flipped through his address book as he sat in his office in the basement. With the door shut, he knew that Sarah wouldn't be disturbing him and he could hear his daughter moving around in her room above him. Hell, it was worth a shot if seeing the number still worked.
“I should have called him when Ava disappeared...” He muttered as he punched the buttons on his own cell. He and John were as unlikely a pair of men as possible. They'd met in basic training years ago, John joined the Marines for the fact he didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of getting into college - or being able to afford it. Stephen had joined due to a feeling of duty - and to avoid being drafted into a less favorable position in the Marines - he'd ended up flying helicopter ambulances. John was from Lawrence, Kansas and he was from Paducah, Kentucky. In another lifetime, they would have met as opponents on a football or basketball team - not as fellow soldiers. The phone rang once, twice, three times and then, between the fourth and fifth ring, it finally picked up.
“Hello?”
“Hello, John, it's Stephen Kittredge.”
“I'm afraid John can't come to the phone right now.”
“Do you know when he will be available? This is rather important.”
“I hate to be the one to tell you this, but John Winchester died four years ago.”
Stephen cursed under his breath. “Who is this, then?”
“This is his son, Dean. How the hell did you know my father?”
“That's a very long story.”
Seven miles away, Dean frowned. This was an unexpected development in the situation. He pulled his father's journal towards him and flipped through it, on instinct, to November of nineteen ninety-seven. A page had been torn out. “I take you don't want to give me any answers over the phone.”
“That would probably be for the best.” Stephen's voice was flat.
“I'm going to give you an address. Be there in one hour.”
*
“Are you sure about this Dean?” Sam said for the third time in thirty minutes.
“The page before the missing one in dad's journal says he was going to see an old friend from his days in the Marines while he was in Indianapolis. I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that Kittredge is the person in question.”
“But if that's the case, then dad would have known about Heather.”
“Thus explaining the missing page.” Dean said, with a wry smile. “I think Bobby's in a good mood finally... he chewed me out for about twenty minutes this morning.”
“Well, in your defense, I think you were really, really drunk that night in Key West.”
“Considering how many spirits I had coursing through me for the first part of the night, I felt it was required.”
“No arguments there.” Sam replied as there was a knock on the door. “I was hoping Cas would be back by now.”
“Maybe he got a lead on God while he was out.” Dean replied as Sam checked the peephole before opening the door.
*
Hours later, Dean stared at the ceiling of the hotel room, willing himself to fall asleep and finding it next to impossible. Tomorrow, he and Sam would leave Jasper and head south, aiming for Nashville. They would then circle back north, heading for Bloomington, Indiana. On Monday morning, at exactly nine thirty, they were expected to be at a small roadside park halfway between here and there. Stephen Kittredge would meet them there - and then, they would leave for South Dakota, taking Heather with them. When he got home from Bloomington, Mr. Kittredge would explain things to his wife - and then they would act as if Heather had run away. Since they'd have at least a seven hour head start, the Winchesters would be somewhere in Iowa by then.
It wouldn't be permanent, that was made very clear. As soon as the worst of the danger was over, Heather was to come back home. In Dean's mind, that meant when Lucifer was back where he belonged. If things started to go their way, for example, they actually found the Colt - then this whole thing could be over by Christmas. He wasn't planning on it, but hell, he'd have Heather back to her parents by the time she turned fourteen at the latest. Granted, he knew that Bobby wouldn't be to pleased to have a house-guest for that time, but hell... wasn't he constantly talking about how family didn't end with blood?
**
Dawn was just breaking over the vast cemetery in Normandy. The white cairns stretched outward, a stark contrast to the brown grass that heralded the long winter. In the stillness, a lone figure walked, past stones engraved with names and a myriad of birth dates. But for many of them, these sons slain so far from home, the date of death was the same: June fourth, nineteen forty-four. Near the end of a row, the figure crouched down and set her hand against the stone. Where this man still alive, today he would be eighty four years old. A tear slid down the figure's cheek as she set a small bundle of bluebells at the marker.
“Did I ever tell you what a nice name you have? Nathaniel. I do hope someone explained to you why I left you there, with your parents. You were a very pretty baby.” She slowly turned her head as she felt someone approaching. “Why are you following me?” She stood up.
Castiel said nothing for a moment. He looked from her to the tombstone and then back, understanding instantly. “I'm sorry.”
“I never did get to see him all grown up... I've not seen him since the day he was born.” Polyhymnia did her best to remain calm. “I'll ask you again, why are you following me?”
The angel stuffed his hands into the pockets of his coat, wincing ever so slightly at the cold. “I need your help.”
“If you're referring to the situation in Indiana, I believe that's been handled.”
“It's not that. The Winchesters don't need your help... I need your help.”
“Help with what, exactly? You might currently be an angel in rebellion, but you're still an angel, Castiel. I'm just about a step above the majority of all the pagan scum. Your kind doesn't like me or my sisters. I also know that if you are ever issued the order to find a way to get rid of us, I'm first on the list for execution. I don't know how I can possibly help you, unless you want me to find you a choir to hide in, or something.”
He took a step towards her. “No. It is not that.” A part of him absolutely hated that he was doing this, another part was partially relieved and the remaining part of him was angry that he even had to do this. “I need your help in finding God.”
Polly blinked at him, surprised. “I thought all of you angels knew where He was. I thought He was in your paradise.”
“Others have told me different. I need to find Him so that Lucifer can be stopped before it's to late.”
“And you think I know where He is why?”
“I know you don't know where He is.” He swallowed once before continuing. “But I can not do this alone and I do not have anyone else I can ask.”
“If I do this, we will both be in a considerable amount of trouble when it is over.” She turned away form the grave and came towards him. “If we fail at this, you'll be sent into the Great Oblivion and I'll be in chains for several hundred years.” She shook her head. “Even if we succeed, I'll be put in chains anyway. This sort of... fraternization is about as forbidden as it gets.” She took a deep breath and then looked up at him. “I will still need to take care of my other obligations.”
“As will I.” Castiel blinked as it started to snow. “So you will do it?”
“Well, as a wise man once said, there are things worth dying for. I'd say helping save the world is at the top of the list.” The corners of her mouth lifted slightly. “I'd also say this is worth the amount of trouble I'll get into for doing it.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “My only question is, where do you want to start?”
“With a thank you.” The angel held out his hand which she took. He could see the faint scars on both of her cheeks from the last time she had been kept in chains, four hundred years ago. That was one other thing he remembered about the Muses. None of them, not a single one of them when they were bound in chains that burned with holy fire did they scream. They withstood that pain without a word.
“You're welcome.” Polly responded as she squeezed his hand with hers.
**
The demon slipped through shadows, flying on her new mission. While she was determined that it would be easy, so very easy, she refused to let her guard down. The house was pathetically easy to slip into. She shied away from the crucifix and holy water font at the foot of the stairs. She could avoid that easily - there was only one other one, and that hung in Heather Kittredge's room. She slid under the doorway of the master bedroom and to the right side of the bed.
Sarah Kittredge was deep in slumber as the demon slid into her body. She felt the woman panic for the briefest of moments before the demon started filling through her thoughts, her memory, everything. Stockpiling facts and gathering mannerisms until the demon was almost fully integrated with her. Only then the demon settle down, shoving the true Sarah Kittredge into the back of her own mind. The demon woke for a moment to glance at the clock. It was just after one in the morning. She pulled the warm blankets under her chin and she snuggled her face into the pillow. This bed was far more comfortable than the one at the Babcock's home.
She just had to wait a few days, that was all.
**
Sunday was blessedly uneventful, after the last two days, the less complication the better. The only thing that varied from the norm in the Kittredge family was that Sarah stated she was suffering from a migraine and didn't go to church with her husband and daughter. This wasn't the first time it'd happened, so Stephen thought nothing of it. He tried not think about how this Christmas would be during the homily when the priest was talking about Advent being a season of preparation and joy. There'd be a family member missing - unless a miracle occurred. He had resigned himself that this was for the best and he and his wife's sorrow was worth their little girl being safe.
Monday morning, however, was hectic as it always was. Even though she adamantly refused to go to school today, Heather came downstairs at six thirty for her morning glass of juice and turned the coffee pot on for her parents. She had a feeling that Beth wasn't going to be going to school either... and it would be nice to get together with her and just... talk, or something. Of course, Molly and Lila had been friends with Beth since they were all in preschool, so she wouldn't be surprised if took her more than a few days before she wanted to speak to anyone. That was okay with Heather, she didn't want to push.
“Morning.” Sarah came into the kitchen, rubbing her eyes. “Are you sure you'll be okay here by yourself?”
“I'll be fine, mom. Is there anything I can do for you?” She bit her lip. “I don't know... clean the bathroom or something?”
The demon was almost laughing at how easy she was fooling this girl. “If you want to, sweetie.” She paused. “Could you dust and vacuum the front room, we might get the Christmas decorations out this week.”
“We don't have a tree yet, mom. We gave ours to the Saint John's rummage sale before we moved.”
“Maybe we can convince your father to get a real tree this year. Wouldn't that be nice?”
“I guess...I'll clean up the room.” She refilled her glass and went back upstairs. “What is in that medication for her migraines...”
Sarah poured herself a cup of coffee as a thump sounded on the porch as the paper arrived. “Oh why don't you stay home tomorrow too, little girl... you and mommy can go say you're going to get a tree... and daddy will come home to an empty house.” She took a big gulp of the scalding hot coffee, delighting in the burn down her throat.
**
Wesley hugged his bag to him as his dad maneuvered their sedan down their driveway and onto the street. It'd been a few days since he'd seen the person in the hallway - and even now he wasn't entirely convinced if it had been a dream or not. He knew, at ten years of age, he was far to big to be making up stories. He sighed. “Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“How old is our house?” He asked as his dad slowed at a stop sign.
“It's pretty old...” He thought for a moment. “I think it was built before the War of Eighteen Twelve. Why you ask?”
“I was just wondering... that's all.”
Wesley's father frowned. “Did you notice something wrong in the house?”
“No... no...” He sighed. “Well, could our house be haunted?”
“If we have a ghost in the house, I've never seen it... why do you think there is one?”
“I... I sort of saw someone in the hallway.. it was right after Thanksgiving... and he vanished into thin air.”
Noah, Wesley's father, chuckled. “I think you might have had a little to much to eat... you were probably dreaming.”
“Yeah... probably.” He sighed as his father turned into the circle drive of his school. “There's no such things as ghosts, right?”
“The general consensus on that is no, but it's yet to be completely proven one way or another.” He gave his son a cheerful smile as he stopped the car. “If we have a ghost, that could explain all our missing socks in the laundry.”
“I think the missing socks were turned to dryer lint.” He unfastened his seat belt. “I'll see you later dad.”
“Have a good day, son.”
He opened the door. “I'll try.” He shouldered his bag and headed into school.
**
In keeping with routine, the demon took a shower, got dressed and packed herself a small lunch of leftover pasta before leaving for work. As she shrugged into her coat, she saw Stephen come down to the kitchen for his second cup of coffee. “Now, what time did you say you'd be back from Bloomington?”
He set his coat on one of the chair-backs and then his briefcase in the seat. “No later than five-thirty. I'll call if I'm going to be late.” He came over and kissed her on the cheek. “Have a good day.”
“You too.” She smiled and picked up her purse and keys. “Anything in particular you want for dinner?”
“Oh, just about anything is good. After a lunch provided by campus dining, I'd probably be happy with peanut butter and jelly.” They both laughed as Sarah put on her coat.
“I'll see you tonight.” She went into the garage and a moment later, Stephen heard the door open, the car start up and pull away. After he heard the door close again, he walked to the front room and watched the car drive away. He then put his coffee mug down and went upstairs. He knocked once on Heather's door before opening it.
“Dad?” Heather looked up from the book she was reading. “What's wrong?”
“Do you know where your duffel bag is? The big green one you packed last May?”
“Yeah, it's in my closet, why?”
“I want you to get it out, pack as many of your clothes into it as you possibly can.”
“What's going on?”
“Just do it. Quickly.”
“O...Okay...” She got up and went to her closet and pulled the bag down from her shelf and opened her dresser and started to empty it of it's contents. Heather was worried. Her dad had never acted like this that she could remember. She heard him go downstairs into the basement but she kept packing, going into the bathroom to get things like her toothbrush and other items. “Please don't be sending me to Aunt Shelly's house.” She zipped the full bag closed, glancing once into her closet to see that she'd left most of her skirts and dresses hanging up. After emptying her backpack of her schoolbooks, she put her laptop, her I-pod, its charger, a sketchbook, a battered teddy bear she'd had forever and her autographed copy of D.J. MacHale's Raven Rise. She was wondering if there was anything else she should pack when her father came back into the room and handed her two items. One was her passport and the other was a thick white envelope. She recognized it at once. “This is the emergency fund.”
“This is an emergency. Put those in your backpack. I'll explain in the car.” He turned the light out in her room, picked up her bag and went downstairs.
Heather did as asked, adding the snapshot of her and her parents and her wallet to the bag before following her dad, stopping in the downstairs hallway to get her coat. She frowned when she passed the stairs - he'd turned the TV on and the second disc in the Return of the King box set was playing.
“Hurry.” Stephen took the backpack and put it into the trunk of his car. “Don't open the door.”
“Daddy, you're scaring me.” Heather stood on the step leading down to the garage, noting that her father looked nervous.
“Get in the backseat and sit on the floor. Please.”
Part of her wanted to demand an answer, but the look on the man's face was enough for her to know that now was not the time to be obstinate. She did as asked and as she shut the door, she heard the garage door opening.
Stephen got into the car and glanced back at her. “I love you baby girl, you know that, right?”
“Yes, dad. I love you too.” She swallowed. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No, Heather, you didn't.” He started the car up and they pulled away from the house. “A long time ago, back when I was in basic training in the Marines, I met a man named John Winchester. He was from Kansas and he was a pretty decent guy. We went to Vietnam together and when that was over, he went home to Lawrence and I went to school in Lexington.” He took a breath. “Anyway, I finished school and started working in Louisville and he kept in the family business of auto mechanics.”
“You met mom in Louisville.”
“That's right. Well, John eventually married a woman named Mary and they had two kids, Dean and Sam. Well, when Sam was six months old, there was a fire at their house and Mary died.”
“That's awful.” She rubbed her nose and reached over to get a Kleenex from the box on the floor behind the driver's seat.
“Yeah, it was. Well, after that John sort of went off the deep end. He was convinced that it wasn't the fire that killed her, but something else. So he spent the rest of his life traveling across the country, trying to find out what killed her.” He shook his head. “I thought he was crazy at first.”
“Did he find it?”
“Yeah... yeah he did. And in the end, the same thing killed him.” He sighed. “You don't remember this, but back when you were just a year old, John came to see us in Indianapolis. He's the one who gave you that bear you're so damn fond of.”
“Mom knows him?”
“She didn't know about the visit, she was in Florida for one of those conferences she goes to.” He took the turn onto the rural highway a little slower than he normally would have. “A demon killed Mary and John Winchester. This particular demon is dead, but there's still more out there.”
“Like the one that killed Lila and Molly?” She bit her lip. “That's what killed them, right?”
“Yes. Remember those two men who found you and Beth?”
“Uh huh.” That was a clear understatement. As muddled as that night seemed, she could remember the two men clearly - well, one of them at least.
“Well, those were the Winchester brothers - Sam and Dean. Now, they can explain these things better than I can, because my knowledge of this world is limited.”
A cold feeling of dread sank into Heather's stomach. “Daddy, where are we going?”
“I'm going to Bloomington.” He swallowed hard. “You're going with the Winchesters.”
“Why?”
“Because they can keep you safer than I can.”
“Is this because one of them looks like me?”
“Dean will explain that to you. He's the one you look like.” Stephen kept his eyes straight ahead. A truck passed by them going the other direction. “When the danger's over, they'll bring you home. Which I'm hoping is sooner than later.”
“Why can't we all go?” She knew she was probably pushing his temper asking this many questions, but at this point, she was starting to panic.
“I think the demons are a little more interested in you than they are with your mom and me.”
“Does mom know you're doing this?” She replied with a sob.
“No. I'll explain it to her when I get home.” Stephen's grip on the steering wheel was white. Doing this was so much harder than it had been talking about it. He couldn't fathom what Sarah's reaction would be when he told her.
“Dad, you'll get in trouble... I'll get in trouble...” She swallowed. “What if mom...”
“We're going to tell people you ran away.” He broke in. “I don't think we'd have a hard time convincing people of that.”
“The cops will issue one of those Amber Alert things...” Heather's mind was moving quickly. Did her dad really think he could pull this off?
“Do not worry about the repercussions of this. If we're lucky and keep our prayers said, this will be over by Christmas and you can be home for the holidays.” He let out a weak laugh. “You know as well as I do that those alerts don't always work right away. It took them a year to find that Smart girl.”
“I'm scared.” Heather hugged herself, resting her chin on her knees. “Do you trust the Winchesters?”
“I do, sweet pea. You will be fine - and don't worry about your mom and me.” He steered the car off the highway and into a roadside park where Sam and Dean were already waiting. “We're here.”
Heather nodded and pulled herself into the seat and then opened door, wincing as she stretched her legs. She could not believe this was happening. This was all some really crazy dream. Very vivid, very real, very strange dream, and any minute she was going to wake up back in her bed and see that it was three in the morning. But the cold wind against her cheek won the argument that this was real. She followed her dad to the trunk of the car as he opened it and shouldered her backpack and then lifted her duffel from inside.
Stephen took it from her and they walked across the small parking lot away from his late model sedan towards the black Impala. He'd gone into the jungles of Vietnam thinking he wouldn't come back - all of those walks were nothing compared to this. The urge to take his little girl's hand was so strong but he knew that if he did that, he'd turn right around and this would all be for nothing. He noticed that she was doing a pretty good job of holding back tears. “You're early.” Was the only thing he could say when they reached the brothers.
“Didn't want to be late.” Sam said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He was tired from driving all night while Dean had slept. He'd not been afforded the look that his brother had gotten of the girl. He managed a worn smile. “How are you this morning, Heather?”
“Considering the circumstances...” She thought for a moment. “Okay, I guess. I woke up this morning. That's more than a lot of people got to do.”
Dean took the bag from Stephen and put it in the trunk of the Impala. “It's time we were gone, Sammy.”
“Right.” He said in reply.
Stephen gave Heather a bear hug. “I love you, Heather Grace.”
She returned the hug. “I love you too, dad. Give mom a hug for me.”
“I will.” He pulled away and ruffled her hair before walking back to his car.
Dean slammed the trunk closed. “Let's go.”
“Okay.” She managed to squeak out a reply. All she really wanted to was break down and cry. She pulled the heavy back door open and set her bag on the floor behind the passenger seat as she slid in. The car had the distinct smell of leather and something she couldn't place. She saw out of the corner of her eye that her dad's car was already gone.
Dean shut the door behind her before getting into the car. As they pulled out of the park and headed north, he glanced in the rear-view mirror at their backseat passenger. Next to him, Sam yawned and a few minutes later, he was snoring softly. He inwardly cursed, he'd been hoping his brother would stay awake long enough for them to at least get a word or two out of the girl. Well, he sure as hell wasn't going to spend the drive until Sam woke up in total silence. “Ever been to South Dakota?”
“What?” Heather turned from the window.
“You ever been to South Dakota?”
“Yeah... when I was nine and I went on vacation to the Black Hills. Is that where we're going?”
“Not the Black Hills part, but the eastern part of South Dakota.”
“Oh.” She bit her bottom lip. Clearly, Mr. Winchester was having as much trouble trying to talk as she was. “Is that where you and your brother live?”
“A friend of ours lives there.”
“Where do you live, Mr. Winchester?”
“Dean.” He replied.
“What?”
“You can call me Dean. I don't think I've been called Mr. Winchester since I was in high school.” He sighed. “As for where Sam and I live, you're sitting in our home.”
“You live in this car?” Heather asked incredulously.
“Yeah.” He saw the shocked look on her face that slowly turned to something akin to pity.
“I'm sorry.” She really was. She couldn't imagine having to live in a car, ever.
“We're used to it. Our friend Bobby, that's where we're going - he lives in a house though. I guess that's about the second closest thing my brother and I have to a home.”
“So it's sort of like someplace for you to have a mailing address or something?”
“Or something.”
**
Chuck threw his pencil down in annoyance. He'd not written anything like this in a while - probably not since back in the days when he was still getting published and he wrote Heart. Now here he was, writing about the Winchesters with a kid in the backseat of the Impala. Not just any kid, Dean's kid. He wondered offhandedly if this was some kind of cosmic payback for The Kids Are Alright. Clearly, there was a lot more going on in the world than he was privy too - but since he knew that the mother in question was a Greek Muse...
He was about to pick up his pencil again when the doorbell rang. “Please don't let it be Becky, please don't let it be Becky...” He muttered to himself as he made his way to the door. The last thing he needed this morning was that half-crazed fan of his barging in here. He'd had to stuff all of his writing into a safe and keep the thing locked when she came over.
Which was starting to happen more and more often and becoming borderline scary. The trouble was he was to attached to the house to move, not to mention he couldn't afford it. He peered out the glass and saw a man, older than him, standing there. He opened the door slowly and blinked at the man who was wearing dark sunglasses. “Can I help you?”
“I believe you have some questions that need answering.”
“If you're one of those Jehovah Witnesses, I'm not interested...” He started to close the door when the man reached out and grabbed it, holding it open. “Who the hell are you?”
“I think you already know.” With his free hand, he lowered his sunglasses and grinned. “What was it you called me? Oh yes.. The Trickster.”
Realization dawned on Chuck's face and he stepped aside to let Gabriel in. In his mind, he was glad that he'd actually rang the bell, and not just burst into his house the way so many other angels had.
**
Sam woke up about four hours into the trip, when they stopped for gas. He noted that there was an uncomfortable silence in the car and he couldn't say he was surprised. “Where are we?” He asked tiredly.
“Mount Sterling.” Heather replied as they pulled into the gas station.
He looked at his watch. “This can't be right...”
“You remember to set your watch back an hour for the time zone?” Dean answered.
“Not enough sleep...” He said grouchily and rubbed his face. “Say Heather, you mind switching seats with me?”
She nodded. “Uh, okay.”
“Probably sleep better in the backseat....” He muttered to himself as he got out of the car.
Heather didn't say anything as they switched, she put her backpack in the front seat and then went into the convenience store to use the facilities. The past four hours had been extremely long - she was still in shock and she wagered Dean couldn't think of anything to talk about with her. Around one hour into the four, he'd told her to get the atlas and start checking for highways for him. That had at least been something to do. Why they couldn't just get onto an Interstate and not take the confusing state highways made no sense to her. Then again, nothing about today had made any sense.
Sam had settled into the back seat, glad to be able to stretch out a bit. He'd spent almost all last night driving back to Indiana from Nashville - he and Dean had stayed in town down there long enough to have the first decent meal they'd had since Thanksgiving. He heard the door open and then heard it slam shut. “Door's pretty heavy, isn't it?”
“Yeah.” Heather replied. “How old is this car anyway?”
“It was made in sixty-seven.”
“It still works?”
Sam was glad Dean wasn't in the car to hear that or his chuckle. “It's been well taken care of.”
“I shouldn't say anything... there's an eight-track player in the basement at my house. I took it to school one time and only two kids in my class knew what it was.”
He laughed in reply. “Sometimes I'm surprised this car doesn't play eight tracks...” He yawned again and closed his eyes.
“I'll let you sleep.”
Dean got into the driver's side. “You didn't need anything, did you?”
“No, thank you.”
“Right.” He started up the car and they pulled away. “We have to figure out something to talk about, this silence thing is killing me.”
“Okay.” She answered. “But I'm not playing any stupid road trip games.”
“Anyone who plays road trip games in this car has to get out and walk.”
“Does that include playing a game by yourself?”
“I don't think anyone ever has.” Sam said sleepily from the backseat.
“You seen any good movies lately?” Dean knew it was a lame question as soon as he asked it, but it was about the best he could think of at the spur of the moment.
“I've not really gone to any movies lately.... I think the last one I went and saw was Half Blood Prince.”
“What, you haven't seen New Moon?” He said with a laugh.
“I wouldn't go see that movie unless I was paid too. I hate that series.” She said in disgust. “My English teacher told us in the second quarter that we weren't allowed to do any book reports on any book in the series.” She shook her head. “Half the girls in my class freaked and said that was unfair.”
“What'd you say?”
“I said it was a good idea and that they should stop reading crap.”
“Sam, remind me that Heather here gets the extra cookie next time we have a package of them.”
“Okay.” He muttered before he started snoring again.
**
When Stephen pulled into the garage that evening, he was actually surprised he'd maintained a calm demeanor all day. He took a deep breath as he got out of the car, walked past Sarah's and shut the garage door. This was the one part of the day that was going to be the hardest - telling his wife where their little girl went. Steeling himself up to act as if everything was perfectly normal, he opened the door and went inside. “I'm home.” No sooner had he shut the door then he found himself slammed against it.
“Where is she?” A voice snarled at him. It sounded like Sarah, but as he stared at the woman holding him against the door, he knew it couldn't be her. There was no way in hell that a five foot two woman who weighed one-fifty could hold his six foot three one hundred and ninety pound body pinned to a wall.
“What?” He managed to gasp out and then he saw her eyes - Sarah's eyes were solid black. “Who...” He struggled to break free. “Where's Sarah?”
“Oh she's here.” The demon tapped her free hand against her head. “She's in here, watching Stephen. When we came home and found this house empty, she sure was happy about it. Too happy for my taste...now where is Heather?”
“I don't...”
“Liar.” She backed away and flexed her hand, keeping him pinned to the wall with her powers. “You sent her away. You foolish, foolish man...”
“Get out.”
“No.” She smiled, her eyes still solid black. “I know what you did. You sent her off with the Winchesters.”
Stephen knew that the shock on his face gave him away. “Leave her alone.”
“Oh, afraid it's to late for that. My father wants to see her - and he'll find her. She can't hide from him.”
“Don't be so sure of that.” He wheezed as he felt something in his chest tighten.
“You're an old man, Stephen Kittredge. You also wouldn't hurt me because you'd be afraid of hurting your wife.” She backed away from him a little further smiling. “I'm going to kill you... and she's going to watch me do it. It's a pity she's not so young...” She giggled, the noise sounding odd coming from a fifty year old woman. “I do look forward to her explaining how she didn't do it. Who's going to believe her if she said she was possessed?” She pulled her powers back and let him fall to the ground. “Now...” She was cut off as Stephen charged, shoving her into the china cabinet.
Stephen raced into the family room heading for the stairs as he heard the sound of shattering plates and glass rain down behind him. He didn't know how save his wife, hell, he didn't know how he was going to save himself. He couldn't bring himself to leave Sarah alone. He'd almost reached the stairs when the demon tackled him from behind.
“Big mistake.” She snarled and rolled him over.
Reaching blindly upward, Stephen grabbed the holy water font at the foot of the stairs and ripped it from the wall, arching it towards the woman. Sarah, I'm so sorry, Sarah... The plaster shattered against her head and she bellowed in pain. Not so much from the impact, but from the contents of the font. It'd not been much, but it was enough that she'd backed up and was trying to rub the substance away from her. Realization hit him and he took advantage of her distraction to race up the stairs and into the master bedroom. He grabbed the plastic bottle off of his dresser just as the demon charged into the room, blood streaming down the side of her face.
“Bastard.” She gasped from the doorway.
“Go to Hell.” He unscrewed the cap as she charged at him and just before she made impact, he upended the bottle of holy water on her.
The demon screamed in agony as the water gushed down her face, burning her. The more it poured into her, the more it stung. It became unbearable as some of it fell into her mouth and then she roared in defeat.
Stephen watched as black smoke poured out of Sarah's mouth and eyes, howling towards the ceiling before shooting underneath the small gap under the window and outside. He dropped the bottle on the floor just as his wife slumped the ground. “Sarah...” He went and rolled her over. “I'm sorry...”
“I'm okay.” She let out a blubbery cough. “It was awful... she... she...”
“Ssh..” He kissed her forehead and cradled him to her. “You're safe now.”
“I guess there are such things as smoke monsters...” She closed her eyes. “I'm so tired...”
He slid his hand down her back, checking for injuries from where she'd hit the cabinet. Thankfully, nothing seemed to be broken. “I'm sorry.” He said again.
“I was glad to find Heather gone, Stephen.” She said weakly.
“Honey, are you okay?”
“I think it's my insulin.” She winced.
“I'm going to go get you some juice.” He set her against the bedstead, kissing her cheek. “Just hang on.” He turned and ran for the kitchen. When he came back, he helped her drink. “Don't you worry. I'll take care of things.”
Sarah took another sip of the drink, feeling her body slowly start to calm down. “Heather's safe, isn't she?”
“Very safe.” He held the glass for her and kissed her forehead. “You can rest if you like. I'll clean things up and then I guess I better call the cops and tell them our little girl has run away.”
She managed a weak laugh. “How did she get out of Jasper?”
“No idea. You want something to eat?”
“No... not yet.” She took the glass from him and took a drink on her own. “I just want to sit here for a bit.”
“Sure.” He stood up and retrieved a towel from the bathroom and pressed it against the side of her head. He glanced at the empty bottle. “Guess it's a good thing I filled that up when we were at church yesterday.”
“I'm just glad you found something to get that... thing out of me.” She took another sip of juice.
He finished cleaning the side of her face. Thankfully, there was just a tiny cut on her forehead. “You need something more to drink?”
“No.” She smiled. “I'm going to sit here a while, though.”
“Okay.” He pulled the cloth away and stood. “I'll go clean things up and then we'll do what we need to.”
She nodded in reply, still holding onto her glass.
Stephen tossed the bloodstained towel into the laundry hamper and went downstairs. The damage to the cabinet was negligible - the dishes had taken the worst of it. “Guess this answers the question of what Sarah's getting for Christmas.” He got the trash can and started tossing the broken plates into it. Those that were just chipped slightly he set on the dinning room table. After he was finished, he took the back to the large trash can in the garage. When he went downstairs to retrieve the vacuum, however, he stopped short. Someone was sitting in the large easy chair, flipping through one of the photograph albums.
“Hello, Stephen.” The voice was eerily placid.
“Who?” He found himself staring at a man who looked to be in his mid thirties - but he looked - wrong, somehow. Faint blisters were apparent on his forehead, as if the body was trying to hold something in and almost failing.
“I'm going to have to give this girl's mother credit, she did a lovely job of hiding her.” He looked up then and he smiled as he saw the older man falter a bit. “But of course, you already know about Heather.”
“Who are you?” He backed towards the stairs, hoping to run upstairs, grab Sarah and get out of the house.
“You thought you could outsmart me.” He shook his head. “Now, this is just going to be so much more complicated...”
“What's going to be complicated?” He was nearly at the stairs when the other man stood, setting the album down.
“I didn't want to have to come down here to do this myself... but as they say, sometimes if you want something done, you're going to have to do it yourself.” He gave a gesture with his hand and Stephen was hurled upward, onto the ceiling. “Did you know that this is how Mary Winchester died?” He looked up at him, smiling. “I was kind enough to knock your wife unconscious while you were busy with that mess in the other room. So her death should be relatively painless.”
Stephen winced in pain as he was pinned to the ceiling and then he realized exactly who this person was. “Go to Hell.” It was a weak attack, he knew - but a small part of him felt satisfied.
“I don't think so.” Lucifer replied and walked up the stairs. He looked around once and then back at the struggling man in the basement. “I'll find your little girl... one way or another.” He spat on the floor. In that instant, Stephen Kittredge burst into flames. The fallen angel didn't stay to watch. He vanished from the house as the fire spread across the ceiling and up the stairs, racing towards the master bedroom where Sarah lay motionless.
*
It was just after ten when the Impala pulled into the Singer Salvage Yard. All three of the occupants were tired, even Sam, who'd slept half the way there. It was still cold, but thankfully some of the snow from Thanksgiving had melted away. Heather was probably the most tired of the three - to much had happened today and all she wanted to do was sleep. She shivered slightly in her coat as they got out of the car and they all got their duffel bags from the trunk.
Bobby, who'd been watching from the window, wheeled himself over to the door and opened it. “Get in here before you all freeze, ya idjits.”
“Hey Bobby.” Sam said as they came into the house.
“Heard from Jo and Ellen.” Was the old hunter's reply. “I've spared Dean the long story and told them everything.” He looked pointedly at Heather, who had come in last and was shutting the door. “So they're heading back here as soon as they finish up in New Orleans.”
*
Heather looked around the small room she'd been told to go up to and 'get settled' or something like that. This was the first room, other than the kitchen, she'd seen in this house that wasn't packed full of books. Not that she minded the thing about books. Perhaps Mr. Singer would let her read some of them while she was here. The room had no closet, just a dresser that was in desperate need of dusting. “Looks like I'm cleaning tomorrow.” She set her bag on the floor and her backpack on the surface of the dresser. The lone window looked out over the front of the house, although she couldn't see much in the dark, other than the Impala just partially bathed in the glow from the front porch light.
“It could be worse.” She told herself quietly as she opened her backpack and took out the photograph and stuck it in the corner of the dresser mirror. “I don't think they'd object if I went to bed.”
*
Dean woke with a small start shortly after midnight. He looked up from the couch he was sleeping on and looked blearily into the kitchen. Castiel was standing there, leaning against the sink. Rubbing his face, he got up and staggered into the other room, yawning. The sooner he talked to the angel, the sooner he could go back to sleep. He'd already told the angel about personal space - he wondered if he could get the concept of 'ungodly hours of the night' into his mind as well.
“She's here, isn't she?” Castiel looked away from him, his gaze focused on the empty stairs.
“Heather you mean? Yeah, she's asleep upstairs.” He frowned, wondering how the angel couldn't sense her presence.
The angel looked down for a moment and then looked Dean straight in the eye. “Sarah and Stephen Kittredge are dead.”
“What?” He suddenly felt very cold. He'd not told Heather about their relationship - now, on top of that he was going to have to tell her that her parents were gone? “How?”
“Lucifer.” He turned away from him again. “Polyhymnia is taking care of the details of concerning the whereabouts of Heather.” He tilted his head. “She said as one of the inventors of bullshit, she said it would be no problem.”
“Is that what she said?”
“That is exactly what she said.”
Had the situation not been so tragic, Dean might have laughed at that. He ran a hand down his face. “Damn it...” He rubbed his eyes. “I'm not waking her up to tell her all this. She should have at least one last night of uninterrupted sleep.”
*
Castiel left shortly after that, but before returning to the couch, Dean went upstairs and peered into the room Heather was sleeping in. On the bedside table, her I-Pod glowed faintly as the strains of Jefferson Airplane's 'Long John Silver' came from the headphones. He went over and glanced at the device and cracked a small smile when he saw the title of the playlist: Songs I'm Not Supposed to Like.
He turned and walked out of the room, shutting the door quietly. Yesterday had been rough - today, however, was going to be pure emotional hell. For him and for Heather.
In spite of himself, he had to wonder what else was on that playlist.
Chapter Five