Title: Crossbones
Author:
baylorsrRating: R
Pairing: John/Mary
Summary: The day they buried Mary’s parents, she sat John down at her kitchen table and told him that her family hunted monsters.
Word Count: 17,772
Note: An AU story set after the 1973 events of In The Beginning. This story was written in December 2009/January 2010, before The Song Remains The Same aired, and some of Mary’s backstory as given in that episode doesn't fit with this story. The story is about John and Mary but is a Gen story. Thanks to
liptonrm and
oselle for being my sounding board, making suggestions and putting up with me in general.
Soundtrack Part One 3. The Levee’s Gonna Break
In 1980, Bobby called. “Well,” he said, “I’ve got an idea.”
Dean strapped into the carseat in the back of the Impala, they drove to South Dakota. Jim Murphy was already there.
Dean spit up half his lunch on Bobby, then peed through his diaper while sitting on Jim’s lap. He escaped, naked, from the bathroom while Mary was trying to clean him up, tottering into the living room in his aggressive, bow-legged baby strut, and knocked over a pile of Bobby’s books before throwing an empty beer can at John’s head.
“Some kid,” Bobby grunted.
“Ahh plafttt!” Dean declared, and ripped Bobby’s trucker cap off his head when he crouched down in front of the baby. He waved it triumphantly.
Mary caught him and dressed him, and she and John wrestled him into the playpen they’d brought - he hadn’t figured out how to climb out of it. Yet.
Bobby was pouring coffee in the kitchen. “We done monkeying around with monkeyshine there?” he asked, and set a cup down for each of them before sitting down with a heavy sigh.
“Here’s my thinking,” he said. “We need to find that book. We all agree on that?” He waited for a chorus of nodding heads. “And the clock is a-ticking on Mary and who knows how many others. Myself, I don’t feel like waiting for that clock to wind down. I’d rather do this thing on my own schedule.”
He paused for a drink, and Mary said, “You want to summon the demon that possessed Karen.”
Bobby set down his cup. “Yep,” he said.
“Summon - no!” Jim said in horror. “We’re not going to engage in witchcraft and actually call that thing. It’s - that’s what we’re supposed to be stopping.”
“I’m here to stop evil,” Bobby said. “We call this thing, we get it in that Devil’s Trap, we find out what it did with the book, and then we send its ass to hell.”
John finally had something to say, a clear thought through the whirlwind in his head. “How will we get it to tell us where the book is?” he asked.
“I’ve got some ideas,” Bobby said grimly.
“Me too,” Mary said. She leaned forward over the table. “How do we summon it?”
“No.” Jim spoke forcefully and stood up. “We are not bringing some evil thing into this world, no matter how badly we need what it has.”
“Then leave,” Mary said without anger. “You don’t have to be part of this, Jim.”
Jim stared down at her, angry and torn and betrayed, while Mary looked coolly up at him. Finally, he turned and went outside to the porch.
Somewhere inside the questions and fear and hope swirling around in John, he wondered if this was how Mary had looked when she’d made her deal, unwavering and unrepentant. Her eyes fell on him, and his throat went dry and he couldn’t speak.
“In or out, John?” she asked, and he lowered his head and reached for his coffee. He took a scalding swallow, then fiddled with the mug.
“How will we summon it?” he repeated Mary’s question. “And get it into the Devil’s Trap?” He looked up to find Mary and Bobby both staring at him. “I’m not against this,” he said carefully. “But if we’re going to do it, we need to do it right. I don’t think we’ll get a second chance if this one goes south.”
“We can’t use the text that Karen used in the first place,” Bobby said. “I’ve studied that thing backward and forward, and near as I can tell, it brought the damn thing straight up from hell. Guess it took it a couple of days to crawl up into Karen, but now that it’s loose in the world, it could be in anyone.”
“Unless someone else has already exorcised it,” Mary said, and Bobby shrugged.
“If they have, my idea won’t work, but I doubt it,” he said. “I’ve had my ear to the ground pretty firm for more than 10 years now, heard of a few exorcisms, but nothing that sounded like this thing.”
“How could you know?” John asked. “Hell, for all we know, this demon and the one Jim exorcised could be the same.”
Bobby shook his head. “They’re all different,” he said. “They’ve got - personalities. I could be wrong, sure, or I could have missed it through the grapevine, but my money’s on this thing still walking the earth free. Besides, if someone has sent it back to hell, what I want to try won’t work - just be a dud. Won’t bring anything else running. Or shouldn’t, at least.”
“How’s that going to work?” John asked, and Mary answered him.
“You found its name,” she said, and Bobby nodded.
“Not in Karen’s book, but a related text. Had a lot of the same materials in it,” he said. “We know it now, and we can call it here.”
“You can’t summon it into the Devil’s Trap,” Jim said from behind them, and they all turned to look. He had come silently back into the house and was standing in the kitchen, hands in his pockets. “The ritual won’t work.”
Bobby nodded slowly. “Summon it into the house, though, and I bet it goes straight for us,” he said. “Bet it’ll be mad as hell. Bet it won’t watch where it’s going.” He pushed back from the table and went into the living room.
“Bet it won’t look up,” Bobby said, standing beside the playpen.
They all looked up. There, above Dean happily banging his toy car against the playpen’s slats, painted on the ceiling, was a Devil’s Trap.
* * *
They couldn’t leave Dean anywhere except with other hunters, John and Mary decided, given the enormously reckless acts they were about to engage in, so they drove halfway back home, to Nebraska, to leave him with Bill and Ellen Harvelle.
Driving north again, John said abruptly, “We should have a will, say that Dean’s to go to Bill and Ellen, or Jim, if we don’t take him with us.”
“Cheery thoughts, baby,” Mary said dryly.
“I mean it.” John glanced at her sideways. She was eyeballing him in that way that meant she thought he was half-crazy. “Otherwise Glen will probably end up with him, and, I mean, he’d take good care of him, sure, but he doesn’t know anything about what’s out there, what to keep him safe from.”
“Yeah.” Mary was quiet for a moment, then said, “I never wanted to raise a kid to be a hunter.”
John shrugged - it had never occurred to him to raise a kid to be a hunter, but then, he was still pretty new to the hunting business.
“I was going to run off with you, and leave all that behind. Be normal. Be safe,” Mary said. “The thing under the bed would just be a bad dream for our kids, and we could exorcise it with a nightlight.”
She turned her head to look out the window at the night flashing past them. “I thought about not telling you, after Mom and Dad,” she said to the window. “After the deal. Kind of wish I hadn’t told you, some days.”
“Really?” John asked, incredulous, and Mary looked at him, blinking, eyes a little too bright.
“Don’t you?” she asked. “God, John, the things you have to know because of me - don’t you wish we were at home tucking Dean into bed right now instead of leaving him with people we barely know and driving through the night to call up a demon?”
John shrugged. “Maybe I’d be happy because I wouldn’t know any better, but it would be a lie, Mary, and sooner or later it would have come out,” he said. “Besides, then we wouldn’t really know each other. I don’t want that.”
Mary was smiling slightly. “You want to know what I look like when I’m beheading a vampire and covered in blood?” she asked, and John grinned.
“You look sexy with that machete,” he said.
Mary shook her head. “You are full crazy, John Winchester,” she said, and then slid across the bench to kiss his cheek.
“Runs in the family,” he said.
* * *
It was well past midnight when they got back to Bobby’s. He’d cleared some floor space in the living room, not under the Devil’s Trap, and lines were already laid out in chalk, candles ready to be lit. Bobby looked up from the couch where he was studying a book when they came in.
“We doing this now?” John asked, jerking his chin at the set-up. “You don’t want to wait until morning?”
“Mary,” Bobby said with a sigh, “let me know when you find John’s balls.”
“Oh, listen, Bobby,” Mary started, but then Jim came into the room and she cut herself off. Jim shook his head admonishingly at her and John laughed as she blushed.
“Ready?” Jim asked, and they were all abruptly serious.
Jim insisted on a prayer before they started. Bobby grumbled some about it, but finally said, “Well, can’t hurt,” and at the end, he joined them in saying, “Amen.”
Dear God, give me courage, for perhaps I lack it more than anything else.
I need courage to fight against the devil, against terrors and troubles, temptations, attractions, darkness and false lights, against tears, depression, and above all fear.
I need Your help, dear God.
Strengthen me with Your love and Your grace.
Console me with Your blessed presence and grant me the courage to persevere until I am with You forever in heaven.
They all took a deep breath and stared at each other. “Here we go,” Bobby said grimly, and knelt down to begin. They knelt across from him. Bobby lit the candles on the edges of the markings with a hand that shook ever so slightly, then flipped open the book and started reading, ancient syllables wrought with power. When he finished, he lit the final candle in the middle, and it gave off a flare that made them cover their eyes.
When they looked back, the feeling of power, of darkness, was gone. The candles flickered gently, and the kitchen light poured through the open door.
“Huh,” Bobby said, and scratched his beard, looking back down at the text. Mary got to her feet and peered into the kitchen. John got up and went to the foot of the stairs, looking and listening, but all was quiet. Jim went into the study and came back out, shaking his head.
“Guess I coulda read it wrong,” Bobby said. He leaned over and blew out the candles before standing. “We could -”
Bobby never got to say what they could do, because someone kicked in the front door and came barreling in, with a shout of, “Honey, I’m home!”
The demon was inside a short, thin balding man wearing a horrendously garish open-necked shirt and polyester pants. It grinned cockily at them.
“Hail, hail, the gang’s all here!” it chirped, then turned to Bobby. “Baby,” it said, putting a hand over its heart, “and here I thought you didn’t care. Wow! This is like coming back to the old homestead for me. Love what you’ve done with the place.”
“I’m ready for you this time,” Bobby said, his face shadowed and his voice low. “Things are different now.”
The demon tossed back its head and brayed with laughter. “What, you mean different from when you killed poor, sweet Karen?” Its eyes gleamed with cruel mirth. “Too bad, that. I owed her a great debt, springing me from the pit and all.”
“And now you’re going back there,” Jim said, and started chanting.
The demon snorted, then snuffled, then doubled over with laughter. “An exorcism!” it squealed. “Why, that’s just adorable. Look, you’ve got your own priest and everything. Oh, Bobby, the trouble you’ve gone to. It’s touching, really.” It looked around the room, beady eyes passing over John dismissively, then spying Mary.
“And who else did you bring to the party?” it asked, suddenly interested. “Look at you, golden girl.” It cocked its head as Jim’s chanting trailed off into futility, then took a step toward her. Mary lifted her chin defiantly. “And what’s touched you, sweetheart?” the demon whispered. “Someone’s been making deals. Naughty naughty.”
“Screw you,” Mary said, and tossed a cup of holy water into its face. It screamed, steam coming off its reddening skin, and then whipped its head around, snarling, eyes pure black.
“You little bitch,” it spit out, and Mary turned and ran across the room. It was after her in a heartbeat, its hand outstretched, palm out, eyes glistening - and then it stopped. Panting, it slowly raised its eyes to the ceiling.
“Welcome home,” Bobby said maliciously, and the demon screamed, breaking out windows and shaking the house.
* * *
They started with holy water, tossing it by the cupful into the circle of the Devil’s Trap. The demon screamed and tore at its hair and cursed them while its skin blistered and sizzled. It bounced from side to side of the unseen walls holding it in, reverberating back from the barrier as if it were physical.
It tossed itself to the floor and covered its ears and screamed when Jim began praying, then started pounding its head against the floor. “Shut up!” it screamed. “Shut up shut up shut up!”
“You want us to shut up?” Bobby asked it. “Tell me what you did with the book, and this will all be over.”
The demon jerked its head back and snarled at him. “Please. You’re not letting me go. You’re sending me back to hell. Do you know what hell is like?” it asked scornfully.
Bobby shrugged. “Little toasty, I’ll bet.”
The demon laughed, a hoarse, grating sound that was in no way human. “I’ll tell you if you let me go,” it said. “Otherwise, no deal. Do you know what they’ll do to me down there?”
“Guess the big bosses won’t be happy with you,” Bobby said, and looked like he was thinking it over. Then he shrugged. “Naw,” he said, and threw a glass of holy water into the demon’s face.
While it screamed and threw itself on the floor, Bobby backed away, into the kitchen, and the others followed.
“It’s not going to tell us,” John said low. “Not without incentive.”
“We’re not letting that thing back into the world,” Jim said, and Bobby shook his head grimly.
“It doesn’t have to know that,” Mary said, and the three men stared at her. She stared back levelly. “Stay here,” she continued. “Let it think I’m acting alone.”
“You’re not going in there alone with it,” John said, grabbing at her elbow as a jolt of panic shot through him.
“John,” she said, in that slightly exasperated way that drove him mad. She put her hand over his on her arm. “Stay right inside the kitchen door, where you can see and hear, but don’t let it know you’re there.”
He shook his head, but while Bobby grimaced and Jim looked despairing, he could tell they were both for it. “Damn it,” he hissed, and she leaned up to kiss him.
“Be right back,” she said softly. Bobby caught hold of her sleeve and held up a single finger. He walked heavily over to the back door, yanked it open and let the creaky screen slam shut, then walked silently back to them.
Mary nodded at Bobby and went into the living room. John pressed himself against the crack of the half-opened door, near the hinges where he couldn’t be seen. The red wallpaper lit by Bobby’s dim, dusty lamps bathed the room in scarlet, his Mary’s hair gleaming gold against it.
The demon had somewhat recovered and was sitting in the middle of the trap, legs drawn up, arms around them, rocking slightly.
“Our little dealmaker,” it said. “What’s wrong, baby? Clock running out on you?”
“I need that book,” Mary said.
“I can’t make deals from in here,” it said. “Let me out and we can talk about it.”
“Tell me and we can talk about letting you out,” Mary said, and began a slow, deliberate walk around the circle. The demon watched her with wary eyes, tense when she disappeared behind it, turning its head to pick her track back up as she circled around.
“What’d you sell?” it asked, sounding genuinely curious. “Your soul? Hope you got something better than your cookie-cutter lover boy in there.”
“My soul’s just fine,” Mary said. “Not going anywhere.”
“That so?” The demon narrowed its eyes, even more interested. “You’re marked, though. Bet you didn’t even know, but I know. I can see. You’ve sealed a deal with someone, all right, and we don’t do things for free downstairs.”
Mary shrugged and circled back behind the demon. “Nothing I’ll miss,” she said. “That’s what he told me.” She paused and leaned, and John tensed, but Bobby’s arm clamped down like steel on his shoulder, holding him in place. “Of course, he’s a liar,” she whispered, so close she was almost inside the trap, and the demon spun its head, snarling.
“Darling, we’re all liars,” it said. “Or didn’t you know? I think you did. But you wanted what you wanted, and now you’ve got it. No way out of payment.”
“I’m used to getting what I want,” Mary said, and continued her arc around the trap. The demon watched her warily.
“Who was it?” it asked, licking its lips. “Who got to swap spit with you, sweet thing?”
“Didn’t catch his name,” Mary said, circling back again. “But he had yellow eyes.”
The demon chortled. “You dealt with him? My, my, my. That’s beautiful. You have no idea.”
Mary came to a halt directly in front of it and crouched down. “I do,” she said. “You think I helped Bobby out just to revenge Karen? Never even met the woman. I’m here to save my own skin.”
The demon’s eyes flicked to the kitchen. “Where’d the men get off to?” it asked.
“Went to the shed,” Mary said. “Find iron chains to tie you up with.”
The demon hissed and shuddered. It ran its fingers nervously over its drawn-up knees. It looked at Mary skeptically.
“I tell you where the book is, you let me out?” it asked.
“Sweeten the deal,” Mary said. “You think you’re the only one who might get their ass handed to them over this?”
It licked its lips again, casting nervous glances around the room. “What else you want?” it asked.
“A name,” Mary said, and the demon snorted a laugh.
“You gonna take on the big bad?” it said, and shook its head. “Well, your funeral, sister.” Then it smiled, cruel and cunning. “That book, though - it’s kind of too good not to tell.”
“Where is it?” Mary asked.
It laughed and shook its head, rubbing its hands together. “Bedroom heating vent,” it said, and Mary blinked at it. “Upstairs.” It hooted and rocked in glee. “It’s been here the whole time! I bet good old Bobby has been going nuts looking for the worthless thing.”
Now it was Bobby whose muscles were tense and ready, and John and Jim both got a firm grip on him. Mary pressed her lips together, stood up, and went up the stairs without a word. She came back down a few minutes later, a dust-covered, heavy old book in her arms.
The demon squealed with laughter at the sight of it. Mary, grim-faced, picked up a glass of holy water and tossed it in its face. It shrieked and fell over.
“Bitch!” it howled, so Mary threw another glass of water at it.
“Stop sniveling,” she snapped when its scream deteriorated into whimpering and muttered curses. “Give me the name so we can finish this before they come back in.”
The demon muttered and rocked and John didn’t think it was going to capitulate, but then it said something, low and foul, that made all three men shudder.
The demon looked up at Mary with beady eyes. “Well, m’lady?” it sneered. “You’ve got what you want. Try to save your gutter soul, if you think you can. If you think it’s worth anything. And let me out of this damnable trap.”
Mary’s face was stone. “Jim,” she called, never taking her eyes from the demon’s. Jim came back into the room, followed by John and Bobby, who went straight for the book. He picked it up, opened it, and nodded.
Jim drew a breath and said the opening words of the exorcism.
“Whore!” the demon shouted, and the room shook. A lamp fell over. It leapt to its feet and threw itself at Mary, mouth open as if it meant to rip her throat out, but it bounced back from the confines of the trap. “Slut! Defiler!”
It screamed and fell back down, writhing, as Jim continued. “You’ll get yours, you lying little cunt!” it shrieked at Mary, who was impassive and motionless at the edge of the circle. “You’ll get everything you deserve!”
Then it turned its face to Jim and howled, face contorting hideously, and there was a heinous laugh in that howl, and it twisted its own head so that they all heard the neck break. Then black smoke poured out of its mouth and up into the trap, which glowed with red embers for a moment.
The smoke disappeared. The body fell over. The room was silent.
“It’s finished,” Jim said quietly.
Mary fell to her knees.
* * *
They took home copies of pages from the book, and spent countless hours poring over them, trying to decipher them, in long phone conversations with Bobby and Jim about them. They spent more hours doing research on the name, learning everything they could about the enemy.
Dean went from toddling to running, from words to sentences. He demanded that everyone give him five, and he rode his Big Wheel around and around and around the kitchen table, where his parents sat scouring demonology texts.
The clock kept ticking.
* * *
John woke and Mary wasn’t beside him. He went to the door and could see the kitchen light shining up the stairwell. He stopped in Dean’s room, but the boy was sleeping soundly, so he went downstairs and paused in the dark living room.
Mary was on the phone. “I know,” she murmured softly into it, then, “I don’t know.” She was quiet, and then repeated, “I know, me too. But we’re working on it.” Another silence, then, “All right. I’ll let you know. You too.”
She stood and hung the phone up. John came into the doorway. Mary turned and saw him, pressed her fist to her mouth, shook her head.
John didn’t say anything. Mary lowered her fist and coughed.
“Eileen Miller,” she said. “From -”
“Saginaw,” John finished for her.
Mary nodded. “She called last year, scared out of her mind. Owned up to the whole thing. Her husband, Jim, went through that windshield, remember? She was thrown out, ended up with some nasty road rash and a broken ankle, but his head was buried in that tree. And some guy pulls up in a car, offers to help.”
She paused, drew a shaky breath, and John finished for her. “Offered to really help,” he said, and Mary gave a bitter laugh.
“Best part?” she said. “Jim’s a drunk. He was a drunk when he crashed that car, he’s a drunk now, slaps Eileen around, and she did it still. She said it was just so horrific, they were newlyweds at the time, the only place she had to go was back home to her parents’ house, where her dad slapped her around -” Mary stopped, shook her head.
“Bad situation,” John said. “But that’s what it preys on, isn’t it?”
Mary sniffled. “Anyway, we’ve talked a couple of times. She called last week, sounded really bad. I couldn’t stop thinking about her, wanted to make sure she was all right.”
“Bad how?” John asked, and Mary wiped her hand over her face.
“Bad like I wanted to check on her,” she said, then gave him something, something small. “Bad like she’s going to make sure her time doesn’t come up.”
John clenched his jaw to keep angry, scared words from coming out of it. Mary crossed the room. She touched his shoulder.
“Come to bed,” she said, and brushed past him to the stairs. He heard her go up them, then into their room.
John stood there, staring into the empty kitchen, for a long time. Finally, he turned off the kitchen light and went to bed.
4. Ruination Day
In 1981, Bill Harvelle and Annie Lovewell called hot on the trail of a werewolf pack in New Mexico looking for some backup, and Mary allowed as how she could use a break from baby-duty. She took the truck, because she still hated the Impala, and waved a hand out the driver’s window as she drove off.
She looked happy, John thought, like she always did setting off on a hunt. Mary may not have wanted this life, but it was in her blood.
He went inside the house and put some things in a duffle, then strapped Dean into his carseat and headed north. He drove six hours straight, and arrived at Bobby’s unannounced.
Bobby took it in stride, like he did everything. John thought it probably had been years since the man had been surprised by anything.
He’d brought a box of Matchbox cars, and set Dean to work at them on the kitchen floor while Bobby poured fresh coffee.
“You’re thinking about the Colt again,” Bobby said, sitting down at the table, and John let out a huff of laughter.
“Anything you don’t know, Singer?” he asked, and Bobby chuckled. “I want to go through the Key of Solomon, see if we can find anything that might have been used to make it.”
“Hmm,” Bobby said, and sipped his coffee. “Thinkin’ we might be able to make ourselves a weapon?”
John nodded. “Why not?” he said. “We’ve sussed out every lead on the original anyone’s ever heard of, and we’re still coming up blank on other ideas. Samuel Colt was no different from you and he - hell, he wasn’t even a real hunter, just a gun-maker. I think it’s worth a shot.”
Bobby sighed, and set down his mug. “Give me a minute,” he said, and left the room.
Dean scooted on his bottom across the floor and ran a car up John’s leg. “Beep-beep!” he said.
“Eyes on the road,” John answered, and Dean beeped some more.
Bobby came back with the Key of Solomon, and John quickly cleared a spot on the table for the massive book. Bobby sat down and flipped to a section, then carefully turned pages until he found what he wanted.
“Here,” he said, and pointed to the margins. More than one person had made notations in this book throughout the centuries, and here someone had written in English, “Bind/blessed silver.”
John leaned over to peer more closely into the margins. The pencil was smudged and faded, but beneath that notation was a very small drawing of a bullet. A symbol was half-smeared away on it.
John raised his eyebrows and looked at Bobby. “Colt?” he asked, and Bobby shrugged.
“My guess,” he said. “Especially when I discovered this.”
Carefully, oh so carefully, he flattened out the spine with one hand. He pressed a finger in between the open pages with the other. In between them were two barely visible torn page edges.
John stared at them, and kept staring when Bobby lifted his hand and they disappeared again. “Someone tore them out,” he said bleakly, and Bobby put a hand on his shoulder. John sat at the table and stared at the book while Bobby went to the cupboard and came back with two glasses of whiskey. He set them further down the table, safely away from the book.
John scooted his chair down, then downed his glass in one gulp. Bobby, who hadn’t sat yet, returned to the cupboard and came back with the bottle. John nursed the next glass along with Bobby. Dean crashed his cars with noises of delight and destruction.
“I’m going to take Dean and leave Mary,” John said bleakly.
“Ah, hell, John,” Bobby said, and pulled off his hat to run a hand over the front of his head.
John shook his head. “I’m going to have to, we can’t find a way out of this,” he said. “She’s not gonna let this thing go down. You know that. She’ll do whatever she has to do to stop it.”
Bobby sighed. “I know it,” he said sadly.
John looked across the table at his friend. “I love her,” he said. “I love her so much, but -” and he gestured helplessly at his son. Dean, some child’s instinct kicking in, looked over and then pushed himself to his feet and ran over to John.
“Daddy,” he said, and climbed up into John’s lap. He patted John’s face. “Daddy.”
“Hey, buddy,” John said. “Want some whiskey?”
“Beer,” Dean said, and Bobby laughed.
“How about some milk?” Bobby asked, and Dean nodded. Bobby brought a glass over, and John helped Dean carefully drink it.
“Well,” Bobby said, watching them, “how about we try Plan B first?”
“This is Plan B,” John said. “Plan A got ripped out of the book.”
Bobby nodded. “I think I’ve got something else we can give a whirl,” he said, and John looked up.
* * *
“A binding spell,” Mary said skeptically when she returned from New Mexico.
“Bobby thinks it will work,” John said. “He’s running it by Jim and a few other people.”
Mary shook her head, tossing dirty clothes from her bag into the washing machine. “Thought a binding spell would just hold something inside a host,” she said.
John leaned in the doorframe. “This one can bind something to a place,” he said. “Bobby thinks he can modify it to bind something to hell.”
Mary set her mouth in a tight line. “And we’ll be up here with no way of knowing if it worked,” she pointed out.
John was silent, because he’d said the same thing to Bobby, who’d asked him if he had any better ideas other than going on the lam with his kid. Out of ideas, John had said it was worth a shot.
Mary slammed the washer lid shut and flipped it on. She turned around, arms crossed over her chest. “What were you and Bobby doing up there, anyway?” she asked crossly.
John shrugged. “Drinking,” he said, and she snorted and shook her head.
“Nice weekend for Dean,” she said. “You let him play with some guns, too?”
“Just knives,” John said easily, and Mary slapped his ass lightly as she pushed past him to the kitchen.
“Guess it can’t hurt to try,” she said hours later when she came to bed. “Nothing else, might buy us some time to come up with something else.”
“I’ll tell Bobby you have every confidence in him,” John said, and Mary shook her head.
“Think that old liar won’t know that for baloney?” she asked, but John didn’t get to answer because she’d crawled up on top of him and covered his mouth with hers.
* * *
They left Dean with the Harvelles, and arrived at Bobby’s house at sundown. Jim and Bobby were waiting for them.
“Here’s the deal,” Bobby said before they started. “This demon? Is one bad bitch.”
Everyone nodded - they had more than a year of solid research behind them.
“Things might get ugly,” Bobby continued. “Things might get ugly as in none of this might work. The trap might not hold it. Holy water might not burn it. The exorcism might not take. But whatever happens, we stick together in this, and we don’t give it one. Damn. Thing.”
“Meaning what, Bobby?” Mary said with an edge, her back straight.
Bobby looked steadily at her. “Meaning if not all of us - not one of us, even - make it out alive, then so be it,” he said.
Mary’s eyes flashed at him, but she was silent as Bobby met everyone’s eyes and held them, waiting until he received nods of confirmation.
Jim blessed each of them with holy water. They armed themselves with iron and consecrated silver, salt and holy water. When they finished, Bobby set his shoulders.
“Hold onto your butts,” he said, and started the summoning ritual.
It was similar, but different, from the last one, and when Bobby finished the incantation, the candles sputtered and burned a bright green. John’s skin crawled, but as the minutes ticked by and nothing happened, the sensation lessened.
Bobby blew out the candles, and they checked the house, inside and out, regrouping in the living room.
“Well?” Mary said.
“Now we wait,” Bobby said grimly, and took a seat. One by one, they joined him. John perched on the arm of the couch and flipped his silver knife in his hand.
Half-an-hour passed. Mary stood from the couch abruptly.
“It could be just taking its time,” Jim said to her and Mary gave him that sour-lemon look.
“It may be all leisurely,” she said, “but my bladder’s not.” She stomped out of the room.
John sighed and slid down to the couch, leaning his head back and studying the Devil’s Trap on the ceiling. He heard Bobby’s chair creak.
“Don’t give up yet,” Bobby said. “We might have to give this more than one go to get it right.”
“Yeah,” John said, because they’d talked about that, but he just wanted it to be over. He heard the toilet flush from the back of the house, and then Mary came back into the room.
“Guess he’s a no-show,” she said, and flopped down on the couch next to John. “Got any more tricks up your sleeve?”
Bobby got up and started picking up the candles. “Let me think on it,” he said.
Jim, leaning his elbows on his knees, fingers steepled, said, “What about the Enochian ritual?”
John could hear Bobby sucking on his teeth. “Maybe,” he said.
“Maybe we should say please,” Mary said. She put a hand on John’s knee and squeezed. He put a hand on top of hers and laced their fingers together.
“Want to try the same one again?” John asked. “We sure of all the pronunciation and everything?”
Bobby muttered something that John couldn’t catch, although he did hear the word “idjit.”
“Yeah, Bobby,” Mary said. “Maybe the same one again. I mean, you’re not really the scholar, are you? That was Karen. You’re just kind of trying to blindly follow in her footsteps.”
“Mary!” John’s head came up in shock. Mary’s mouth was set in a cruel little smile. Jim and Bobby were both staring at her, Bobby red-faced with anger. He turned on his heel and stormed into the kitchen with the lifeless candles.
“What the hell?” John said to Mary. She narrowed her eyes, the smile fading.
“What?” she said in irritation. “It’s true. We’ve been following his lead all these years, and you know what he is, John? A salvage man. I mean, you may not be the most learned guy around, but at least you’re an actual mechanic.”
John stared at her, his mouth open. Jim stood up, and Mary gave him a dismissive glance. “Oh, don’t get me started,” she said. “You? You’re not even a real priest anymore. Not that you even knew what you were doing to start with. That was pure luck, with that little girl.” Mary’s cruel smile returned. “Except, not so lucky for her.”
“Christo,” Jim whispered, and Mary laughed.
“Oh, please,” she said, her eyes as blue as always. “I thought demons were liars. I’m just telling the truth, Jim.”
Jim took a step back, his face frightened and uncertain. John felt frozen on the couch beside Mary. She leaned in close to him, putting their faces together.
“You know what they say, John,” she whispered. “You want something done right, you have to do it yourself. What’re you letting these guys lead us around for? They don’t have a clue.”
She kissed him, pushing her tongue into his mouth and running her fingers through his hair. John sat there motionless, unable to pull away, even as everything in him screamed wrong wrong wrong.
Jim tossed a glass of holy water on her, and she laughed, pulling back just enough to look into John’s eyes. Without breaking her gaze, she reached one hand behind her, palm out, and Jim flew across the room into the wall, where he hung motionless, feet dangling inches from the floor.
“You,” John breathed, and Mary laughed again, low and seductive and pure evil.
“No, baby,” she murmured, “I’m Mary now.”
When she came back in for another kiss, John tried to push her away, but now he actually could not move, was pinned to the couch by something he couldn’t see, something cold and enormous. Mary - the demon - chuckled, and kissed him deeply.
“John Winchester,” it husked. “I’ve been hearing things about you. And here Samuel thought so little of you. If only he could see you now.”
“Get away from me,” John said. “Get out of her.”
“Oh,” it purred, “and so cute. Who’s hot with the kids these days? ‘Cause I bet you could give them a run for their money.” It rubbed Mary’s body against his obscenely.
“I’m going to kill you,” John said. “You hear me? I’m going to wipe you out of existence.”
“Temper, temper,” it scolded, and was leaning in for another kiss when something grabbed Mary’s arm and yanked it behind her and it screamed, shaking the room and knocking the couch - John still on it - back several feet. John was standing before he even realized he was free, and Jim fell abruptly to his feet, and John was trying to make sense of what he was seeing: Bobby with what looked like a poker, the end of it pressed into Mary’s forearm, which was smoking, and now he could smell burning flesh.
“Bobby! No!” John screamed, and dived toward them, but then Jim tackled him and held him to the ground.
The demon screamed again, and turned on Bobby with horrific intent on its distorted face, and Bobby grabbed a fistful of Mary’s golden hair and spun her around by it, then let go so abruptly he fell to the ground, where he scuttled backward like a crab.
The demon roared, and Mary’s face was unrecognizable. Her head snapped back and her mouth opened wide, and John expected to see black smoke pour out of it, but nothing came. Panting, the demon looked down at its arm.
“Son of a bitch,” it said. “Bobby Singer, you fucker.”
The demon was under the Devil’s Trap, and upon Mary’s arm was what John could now see was a binding symbol. It wasn’t going anywhere.
* * *
“I’m going to kill her, you know,” it told them casually. “And you just try sending me to hell. Think someone like me can’t find a way back out? Oh, it’s going to be a personal pleasure to slowly slaughter each one of you. And don’t think I’ll miss sweet little Dean. I’m torn, though. Should I just eat that tender, sweet thing up, or should I take him under my wing? What do you think, Daddy John?” It smiled at him with Mary’s sweet lips.
“I think you’re never going to lay eyes on my son,” John said, chest heaving, as Jim let him go and they climbed to their feet. Jim gave Bobby a hand up, and they stood outside the circle and stared at the demon.
“We ain’t just sendin’ you to hell,” Bobby told it grimly. “We’re binding you there. Have fun with eternity.”
Something flickered across the demon’s face - uncertainty, for just a second. Then the evil little smirk returned.
“Mary’s mad as hell,” it said matter-of-factly. “She thinks you’re the three stupidest sons-of-bitches on the planet. I have to agree.”
“She’ll get over it,” John said.
“Mm-mm,” the demon said. “And you know just how to work that magic, don’t you, John? Boy - you two together? No wonder Dean’s such a little pistol.”
“Don’t say my son’s name,” John hissed, and took a step toward the circle. Jim pulled him back.
“Bobby,” Jim said, “start.”
Bobby looked at them, then back at Mary in the Devil’s Trap. “Not so easy,” he said.
“What’s wrong?” Jim asked.
Bobby shook his head. “I put that symbol there to keep it from jumping ship the second I touched it,” he said. “Needed to get it in the trap, didn’t think much beyond that.”
“And now you have to break it,” Jim said.
The demon laughed. “Told you,” it said. “Stupidest sons-of-bitches on the planet. But, hey, come on in here with me. I’ll show you a good time.”
Jim was grim-faced. He took John by the arm. “Come with me,” he said. “Bobby, watch her. Don’t get too close.”
Bobby nodded, but John dug his heels in. “Where?” he demanded, and Jim tightened his grip and physically hauled him into the kitchen.
Bobby had a pile of iron chains on the floor. Jim filled a pitcher with water and blessed it, then dumped a liberal amount of salt into it.
“What do you think you’re going to do with that?” John asked as Jim poured the contents of the pitcher over the chains.
“We’re going to hold her down and tie her up,” Jim said. “Then we’re going to burn that symbol off and do the binding exorcism.”
John felt sick suddenly, knees watery and cold sweat beading out. He shook his head. “Maybe we should just pull her out, break the symbol,” he said. “I bet the thing just books first chance.”
“Maybe,” Jim said, “but that’s it, then. You know that, right, John? Nothing left to do but wait for it to collect.”
John put his hand over his eyes. “It’ll kill her, we try to put those chains on her,” he said.
Jim gently removed his hand from his face. “It’s probably going to kill her anyway,” he said. “The exorcism itself is probably going to kill her. But this is the only way forward, John. It’s not just Mary. You need to think about Dean now.”
John took a shaky breath, thought about tying Mary up with these horrible chains, burning her already-burnt flesh off, forcing her body through the agony of an exorcism. He thought about Dean, patting his face, saying, “Daddy.”
He could do this.
He helped Jim carry the chains back to the living room.
“Oh,” the demon said, eyes lighting up, “fun and games!” It clapped its hands and bounced up and down lightly.
Jim got a length of chain in his hands, stood before the demon. John and Bobby flanked him, lengths of chain in their hands as well.
“My, my,” it purred, “you boys aren’t so dull as I thought. Come on, then.”
Jim surged forward, into the trap, and reached to whip the chain around Mary, but the demon had him down in a second, hands around his throat, chortling ghoulishly. John let go of his part of the chain and jumped on Mary’s back, trying to get her hands off Jim’s neck. She bucked, trying to unseat him and laughing wildly.
“Ride ‘em, cowboy!” it yelled. “Yee haw!”
A blast of cold water fell over all three of them, and John knew it was holy water, but Mary’s skin didn’t steam.
“Oh, come on,” the demon said in exasperation, tightening its grip around Jim’s neck. “You’re in the big leagues now. All that does is piss me off.”
Jim’s face was bright red, and his tongue came out of his mouth. His eyes were starting to glaze. John desperately pried at Mary’s fingers, and managed to get one off the neck. He yanked it back hard, and heard the bone break.
“Careful, John,” the demon admonished. “That’ll get you arrested for spousal abuse.”
“John!” Bobby said, and he looked up just in time to let go and catch the length of chain Bobby tossed at him. He dropped it over Mary’s head and shoulders, slid the loop up and rolled off her back, and then Bobby took in the slack and pulled.
Mary came off of Jim with a scream of fury and surprise. She squirmed around on the ground like a fish out of water. John crawled to Jim, got his hands in the other man’s armpits, and dragged him out of the trap.
“You bastards!” the demon screamed. “You bastards! I’m going to hunt your families for the next millennia! I’m going to wipe your lines off the face of the planet! I’ll eat your fucking brats! I’m going to kill everyone who’s ever fucking smiled at you, do you hear me?”
Jim’s eyes were half-lidded, but he was breathing, harsh, labored breaths. John propped him up against an armchair and Jim, boneless and speechless, gave him a slight nod.
Bobby had the poker, the end glowing red-hot. “Ready?” he said grimly to John, who nodded.
He leapt into the circle directly onto Mary and tried to hold her still. She thrashed and twisted against him, and he tightened his grip so that Bobby could get to her forearm. When Bobby put the hot poker against the existing burn, the demon screamed, surged forward, and sunk Mary’s teeth into John’s cheek.
He screamed in pain, feeling blood spurt down his face. “Jesus!” he yelled, and Mary turned her head and spat out a hunk of his flesh.
“Hardly,” it hissed, and spit his own blood in his face.
He bolted back instinctively, falling on his ass, and then Bobby had him by the collar and was pulling him out of the circle. The demon in Mary’s skin grinned at them, displaying blood-stained teeth.
“Better make it snappy,” it said maniacally, and slammed Mary’s head into the floor. It did it again, and a rivulet of blood began to trickle from Mary’s forehead.
“Bobby,” John said, his voice shaking. “Bobby, now.”
Bobby started spouting Latin phrases. The demon beat Mary’s head on the floor, the wide grin never leaving her face, which was quickly covered completely in blood. It flowed over her eyes until John couldn’t see them anymore.
From behind him, he heard Bobby say the final words. Mary rolled onto her back, and her body convulsed forward as black smoke poured from her mouth and up into the ceiling. Then she fell to the ground with a lifeless thud.
“Mary?” John said, and she lay limp and unresponsive. He was still on the floor, and he rolled over and went to her on his hands and knees. He gathered her chain-wrapped, battered body to him, and wiped blood off her face with a hand until he could see her.
“Mary,” he said again, and then he was sobbing. He rocked her gently and put his ravaged cheek on her battered head. “Mary.”
* * *
John didn’t know, nor care, what story Bobby had concocted for the cops. They’d unchained Mary’s limp body, and Bobby had announced she had a pulse before he called an ambulance.
Paramedics came and put her on a gurney, and taped a wad of gauze over John’s check, and put an ice pack on Jim’s neck before putting him on a gurney as well. They wouldn’t let John ride in the ambulance, and he had a vague recollection of shaking one of the paramedics, preparing to hit him, and of Bobby pulling him away and into Bobby’s truck, of following the flashing lights through the dark night to the hospital.
He knew that he waited in a too-bright room for too long, and when they finally took him back they just put him on his own gurney and stitched up his face. Bobby came back with him, never took his eyes from John.
Someone came and told them Jim would be all right, but they would keep him for the night to be sure. Bobby asked about Mary and they said they’d find out.
Someone else gave John a shot, then another shot, and he was exhausted, couldn’t keep his head on his shoulders, and Bobby eased him back onto the gurney and pulled the blanket up.
“Mary,” John said numbly, and Bobby nodded.
“I ain’t goin’ anywhere,” he said. “I’ll find out about her. You need to rest now.”
“Dean,” John mumbled, eyes drooping shut. “Check on Dean.”
“Sure,” Bobby said, and John was out.
* * *
Mary didn’t wake for three days. She didn’t look like his Mary, not because her face was bruised and distorted, not because her eyes swelled until they were completely shut, but because she looked so small in that white bed, when his Mary always seemed immense to him, and because she was so still underneath those tubes and wires, and his Mary was always moving.
John took up station at the hard, uncomfortable chair beside her bed and refused to leave, even at the threat of hospital security. He stayed there for two days, and was only persuaded to go back to Bobby’s and rest by the arrival of Dean.
He was in Ellen Harvelle’s arms, and he was clutching at her, uncertain of the strange hospital waiting room. He eyed his father skeptically when John held out his hands.
“Hey, Dean-o,” John said softly. “Guess I don’t look so hot.”
Dean studied him with wide eyes for a moment, then said, “Daddy,” and tilted toward him. John gathered him up and pressed that small body to him. Dean wrapped his arms around John’s neck, but then pulled back and softly patted the bandage over John’s check.
“Owie,” he said in awe, then, “I want Mommy.”
John kissed his head. “Mommy has an owie too, babe, and she can’t see you right now,” he said. “The doctors are going to make her better, though, so we just have to let them work and let her rest. All right, buddy?”
Dean nodded, buried himself in his father’s neck again.
“Let Bobby take you home, John,” Ellen said. “I’m fresh, I’ll stay here with Mary for a while. You can rest and clean up, spend some time with Dean.” She reached out a hand and gently poked Dean’s ribs, and he squirmed and giggled.
John was terrified that something would happen with Mary while he was gone, but he couldn’t let go of Dean yet, so he gave in.
* * *
John was back at her bedside, asleep, when she finally woke and gave a croaked, “John?”
He shot up and reached for her hand before he was fully awake, and he could see blue slits watching him from those battered eyes.
“Mary,” he said, and then he was crying in relief. “My God, Mary.” He squeezed her hand and kissed it.
“Done?” Mary croaked, and John didn’t understand.
“Let me call a nurse, get you some water,” he said, and started to rise, but she grabbed his wrist and squeezed it.
“Is it done?” she asked, a little clearer.
He took her hand in both of his. “It’s done,” he said. “It’s over. It worked, Mary. It worked. And you’re going to be fine.” He kissed her hand again. “You’ve got some kind of angels looking after you.”
Mary shuddered, and John’s forehead wrinkled. “What?” he asked, and Mary shook her head slightly. “Dunno,” she said, and blinked at him, then said, “Dean?”
“He’s fine,” John reassured her. “Ellen brought him up to Bobby’s. He misses you something fierce, but he’s fine, Mary. Nothing’s going to happen to him.”
“It worked?” Mary rasped, and John nodded firmly.
“It’s gone,” he said. “It’s not coming back. That demon can never hurt our family now. Your deal is over. He can’t collect. We’re safe.”
“Moloch?” Mary asked, seeking confirmation. “He’s gone for good?”
John clenched his jaw. “I never want to hear that name again,” he said.
Mary scrutinized him, then nodded, and then tears began leaking out of her ruined eyes. John bent over the bed and kissed them away.
5. Sweet By and By
In 1982, they bought a house of their own. John did some improvements, embedding permanent salt lines in the doors and windows. Mary drew a Devil’s Trap on the living room floor and then covered it with a rug.
“We don’t have to raise Dean like this, you know,” John said to Mary as he carved wards into the lintels. “As a hunter, I mean.”
“I know,” Mary said, and pursed her lips thoughtfully. Then she shook her head. “As much as I’d love Dean to grow up not knowing what’s really out there, he needs to know. What we do, John, what we’ve done - we can’t have it coming back around on us and him not knowing what to do.”
John got off the stepstool and turned to her. “So we still do this?” he asked, and she smiled wryly.
“You’re the one carving wards into our woodwork,” she said, and John smiled and shrugged, flipping the carver in his hand.
“We are kind of good at it,” he said, and Mary leaned up to kiss him.
“The best,” she said, so that settled that.
* * *
In 1983, Sammy arrived, and Mary reached for him while the doctor was still holding him up, red and wet and squalling louder than a banshee. “Hello, Sammy,” she said when he was finally in her arms, her face radiant. “Hello, my love,” and she kissed his forehead.
John curved his arm around Mary’s back and looked into the infant’s face, now quiet and looking at them through squinted eyes. We never have to worry about this child, he thought.
It had been 10 years. Nothing came for them.
* * *
On November 2, 1983, John dreamed that he was back in the jungle.
The tree cover blocked out all sight of the stars and moon, and it was so dark at night that you could not see your hand in front of your face. When you were on watch, you sat and listened and tried not to look too hard, because if you did, you’d start imagining things coming in from all black sides, only to have them smear and fade as they approached.
John sat cross-legged on watch, listening to the men around him breathe, listening to the night sounds of the jungle. He heard a rustle behind him and tipped his head that way to see if it would repeat, or if it had just been some creature passing along. The noise didn’t come again, and John relaxed, his hands easy on the rifle across his lap.
Warm breath puffed on his neck, and John froze. His entire body went rigid, but he was careful not to move even the slightest.
The breath came again, and then there was a low, barely audible, growl.
John stopped breathing, and willed himself to hold his bladder.
The creature behind him was silent for long, long minutes while John held his breath and clenched his rifle and did not move. Then there was a final, dismissive puff of breath on his neck, and a low grumbled grunt, and then one soft rusting noise as the tiger went on its way.
John let out his breath and collapsed forward onto his rifle. He was shaking all over, and it was a long time before he could sit back up.
* * *
With a gasp, John sat up in bed. The house was dark and quiet, and Mary was asleep beside him. He was sweating, and he ran a hand over his face and got quietly out of bed.
In Vietnam, the morning after the tiger, John’s compatriots had accused him of falling asleep on watch and having a really strange dream. As they set out, though, one of them had called out and pointed, and they had all gathered around the huge footprints in the brush, coming right up to where John had sat on watch.
John used the toilet and got himself a glass of water. He checked on Dean, and then on Sammy, but both boys were sleeping soundly. He checked on Mary again, and she was still asleep.
There were no tiger tracks, nothing ominous in the house. Just a dream.
Figuring he wasn’t going back to sleep anytime soon, John threw on his bathrobe and went downstairs. He plopped down in his recliner and found a movie on the television, one of those old war movies his dad had liked.
He turned the volume down low and put his feet up. His pulse slowed down and his eyes started to sag. Should go upstairs, he thought, but was too comfortable to move. He fell asleep.
(Note: If you don't understand what happens next - Mary burns on the ceiling. At the end of Chapter 4, she names the demon they've hunted, the one she thinks she made the deal with, and it's not Azazel. They had the wrong bad guy.)