Unexpected Destinies Chapter 77
Title: Unexpected Destinies
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: up to and including Exile on Main St., AU from the end of season 5
Warnings: AU
Word Count: 3,251
Summary: Sam undergoes the first of the cleansing spells.
PRESENT
Sam's stomach growled loudly as he came out of the bathroom and he scowled. He'd been fasting for forty-eight hours now and he'd had absolutely nothing but water and it was really starting to get to him. The worst times were inevitably when the others left for food, taking turns to go so that he wouldn't be all alone with the knowledge that they were together, eating. Although on some level he was touched by their forethought, he also couldn't help but wonder if perhaps they didn't trust him not to gorge himself while they were gone. Which was totally ridiculous, he could bear a little fast like this, it was hardly anything compared to what he'd suffered down in Hell.
"Ready?" Bobby asked as he looked up.
"Yeah," Sam replied.
While he'd been showering, the others had shoved the beds and other furniture in the room to the side leaving a large space in the middle free. Various symbols had been drawn on the carpet and Sam had a brief thought of how pissed the motel owner would be when this was found after they left, but then he shrugged it off. They should have charged a security deposit if they wanted to prevent this kind of damage. He did make a note to keep the do not disturb sign up until they left, though, as he really just didn't want to deal with the headache this would cause otherwise.
"Well, you've got the place of honor then," Christian joked with a grand sweeping gesture.
Sam merely scowled at his cousin as he stepped past Christian to kneel in the center of the symbols. As he glanced up, he caught the furtive, assessing glance Gwen sent his way and he suppressed a quick smile. He'd been working out more lately and it was more then obvious now that he wasn't wearing a shirt and, cousin or not, he couldn't help but feel proud at having caught Gwen's eye like that if even just fleetingly. It definitely beat the 'delicate features' and 'pretty' comments that Dean's photo had earned his brother.
The thought of Dean darkened Sam's mood instantly. What the hell did his brother think he was playing at, not immediately telling them that the Apocalypse was still ongoing? Had Dean really thought that he and his pet angels could stop it? Even if it had just been Castiel, his brother should have known that was madness, but to add Michael and Raphael to that of all angels? That was just downright insane, even for his big brother and it told him that something wasn't right. Despite all of the crazy, crazy shit Dean had pulled over the years, this was too far, which clearly meant that something wasn't kosher. He just didn't get why Bobby didn't, or couldn't, see it. They must have done something to his big brother to get him to go along with them like this and then managed to twist Dean around enough to turn him against his own family.
It was almost like grooming, Sam realized with a start. Not sexual of course (and even he could admit how ridiculous that notion was in regard to Dean, besides, it would be completely unnecessary, all they'd need was an angel in a beautiful woman and his brother would be all over her like the slut he was), but with Michael himself among Dean's new friends, it didn't take a genius to figure out what the desired result was. How long would it take, he wondered, before they had Dean so turned around and used to following their orders like the good little soldier he'd always been for Dad, that they would do it? How long before they asked his brother the big question? Or were they going to take it a step further and try and twist Dean enough so that he actually begged to be Michael's vessel? With anyone else he might have dismissed the idea outright, but Dean had always possessed this ridiculous need to please those that he latched onto. If they could get it so that Michael was the one that Dean looked to like that, well, then it would happen and probably sooner rather than later. After all, it wasn't like his brother hadn't already tried to give himself over to the archangel before and the banter he'd witnessed between Dean and Michael clearly showed how far they'd progressed from the bitter enemies they'd been before.
Sam was so distracted that he jumped when he felt wet fingers on his back.
"It's just me," Samuel said.
"Sorry, my mind was elsewhere," Sam explained.
He'd completely forgotten about the sigils that needed to be painted onto his back and chest. Well, they weren't strictly needed, but they'd make the cleansing spell stronger so they'd decided to go with them. Sam carefully held still and started clearing his mind. He'd do a few of these low levels spells to get rid of any residual taint from Hell and then they'd be able to do some of the more powerful ones before he'd be ready for whatever ritual the angels had. Christian's earlier words of warning came back to him and he thought about them some more. He was essentially taking the angels' word as far as this ritual was concerned, but he couldn't see what else they could be playing at. Raphael and Donnie Finnerman proved that angels didn't need permission every time they took a vessel after the first time, so they couldn't be trying to trick him into giving Lucifer permission a second time.
So what could it be but what they claimed? Sam couldn't think of anything else that made sense. At worst it was just a scam to win more of Dean's favor and it wouldn't actually do anything to protect him. It was possible but unlikely as the odds of the deception coming out were too high. No, it was much more likely that Michael'd had a taste of his little brother's power and hadn't liked it. Despite all else, Lucifer and Michael had spent months locked together in the devil's cage and Dean's 'Mike' probably hadn't liked what he'd discovered and now wanted to stack the deck against Lucifer. Part of him almost wanted to say tough and refuse to help Michael do it. His own experience with older brother arrogance and controlling tendencies cried for him to not help another big brother do the same to a younger brother and it was hard to overcome. If it wasn't Lucifer and the Apocalypse, he'd do it without a second thought, but it was and he had no desire whatsoever to host the devil in his meatsuit again. Once had been more then good enough, thank you very much.
"You okay?" Samuel asked, finishing up the last sigil on his chest.
"Huh? Oh, yeah, just thinking," Sam stated.
"Well stop it for now," Gwen instructed.
"She's right," Bobby added. "You need to have a clear mind for this."
"I know," Sam replied crossly. "It's just a little difficult at the moment. I went from being free to being in danger of becoming Lucifer's plaything again at any moment."
"Something that'll become even more likely to happen if you don't do this right, ya idjit. Now, suck if up, clear your mind and drink this." Sam pulled a face as he was handed a mug with some kind of viscous fluid. "I'm sorry," the older hunter continued. "Does it disturb your delicate sensibilities?"
"I'm fine, Bobby."
With a second's hesitation, Sam swallowed down the liquid before coughing at the foul taste. It was even worse then he'd imagined from the look of it and he didn't even want to know what was actually in it, something he'd purposefully avoided looking at before as he knew the kinds of things that went into potions of this sort. He was just amazed that Bobby and Samuel had managed to get their hands on all of the ingredients on such short notice and while traveling across the country. They'd decided to head back to the Campbell compound as they had more room there and Bobby and himself had already exhausted Bobby's books on anything Apocalypse related a long time ago. Despite that, they'd known that they couldn't afford to wait as far as the cleansing was concerned and so here they were.
"Though that might just kill me," Sam continued, making faces at the aftertaste. "Are you sure you made it right?"
"What is it with you boys and questioning me?" Bobby demanded. "First Dean and now you. Yes, of course I'm sure. Do you know how many others dare question my knowledge and abilities like this?"
"Dean questioned your knowledge? When?"
"Back when we first summoned Castiel."
"You can summon an angel?" Samuel questioned.
Sam nearly got whiplash as he turned his head that fast to look at his grandfather. To hear Samuel Campbell ask someone else a question about the supernatural was unheard of. On very rare occasions the man would need to consult a book about some obscure little detail pertaining to some creature or lore, but never had he heard his grandfather actually have to ask anyone about it because if Samuel didn't know it, then none of them would. Given the topic, though, it made sense that his grandfather wouldn't know the answer, but it was still a shocking event.
"I actually don't think so, which is probably why it took so long for Castiel to show up," Bobby replied. "I think they know what you're doing, but it's entirely their choice as to whether or not they actually respond and show up."
"So Winchester was right to question you then," Christian deduced.
"We thought we were dealing with some high level demon at the time," Bobby responded and Sam could tell that he was angry. "In which case the spell I used would have been perfect."
"How about we get on with this?" Gwen suggested. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I for one would like to get some sleep and if we're going to do two rounds of this tonight, then we really need to get started sooner rather than later."
With a curt nod, Bobby stepped back and Sam took a deep breath as Gwen and Samuel took their spots at the cardinal points East and West, respectively. Strictly speaking it didn't have to be performed by a man and a woman (and Sam could recall Dad and Dean doing it once though Dean had complained bitterly about having to take the woman's role), but it was best and as they had Gwen, they'd figured it best to do the spell properly. Something about balancing the energies or such.
The incantations were all in Latin and Sam let his eyes fall shut as Gwen and Samuel began chanting, focusing on the words. Almost immediately he felt a mild pain, rather like an itch deep within him and it caught him completely off-guard. Yes, it was kinda good in that it meant that the cleansing spell was working, but they had only just started. In that way it was bad, very, very bad as it really shouldn't be that quick. To make matters worse, the pain quickly escalated into a burning sensation and started to spread within him. By the time that Gwen and Samuel had finished the first quarter of the chant, he felt like his very blood was on fire and it was all that he could do not to scream in pain.
He tried to concentrate on something else, anything else, but failed. All that Sam managed was to become aware of exactly how tense and strained his muscles felt and how much he was sweating. It was like he'd just finished a fierce battle, not merely undergone a small part of a relatively weak cleansing spell. What the hell was going on here? If he didn't know any better, he'd have said he'd been tricked into submitting for something else, but this was Bobby and his family performing the spell, not Dean and his angels. So what on Earth was going on here? Could it really be like Bobby had thought? Could the blood he'd drunk before saying yes to Lucifer still be having an effect? It just seemed like such a ridiculous notion as that had been ages ago. surely that must have worked its way out of his system a long time ago. He definitely couldn't feel it within him anymore and hadn't since he'd first been resurrected. Yet what else could it be?
The fire in his blood intensified until it felt like it was boiling within him and Sam tasted blood in his mouth as he bit his lip in an effort not to scream. Somehow it kept getting worse, spreading to the rest of his body and reminding him of Hell and what it had felt like to be helpless at Lucifer's mercy those few times the archangel had chosen to focus on him instead of Michael.
Were they at the end of the chant yet? Sam had completely lost track and couldn't seem to focus enough on what was being said to make out the words. He couldn't even tell apart the two voices anymore. All he knew was pain and burning.
Finally unable to take it anymore, Sam screamed and collapsed onto the floor in a twitching, writhing mess before darkness consumed him whole.
/
Bobby was ashamed to admit that he hadn't been paying attention to Sam at the start of the spell, but had rather been focusing on Christian Campbell. The man continued to annoy him and he found his dislike for him growing even more. On some level he knew that everything that the man did wrong got compounded by the fact that Dean would never have done it, but he couldn't help but make the comparison. Yes, it wasn't fair on Christian, but the way the man had put Dean down, so easily passing judgment over things he neither understood nor knew the full details of, made it so that he just didn't care. Besides, even if it had, that still left the fact that Christian had made those mistakes in the first place, to mention nothing of his despicable personality.
Regardless, Bobby was ashamed that he'd not been focusing on Sam at such an important time. In his defense, however, he hadn't expected the boy to react quite so badly as soon as he had. Yes, he'd been one hundred percent certain that it would be worse then Sam seemed to realize, but even he'd never seen this coming.
"Stop!" Bobby cried out as soon as the boy collapsed.
"What the hell?" Christian demanded.
"It was too much."
And damnit, they'd hardly finished the first quarter of the chant! Bobby felt fear grip his heart at the realization. If the boy couldn't even take such a low level spell, then what did that say for the condition of Sam's body? For the sheer amount of taint on it? And what about the boy's soul? He swallowed thickly at the thought even as he reached out and gently turned Sam over so that he lay on his back. As he'd expected, the boy was out cold, though his face was still a mask of pain.
"Exactly how much demon blood did he drink?" Samuel demanded, shaken.
"A lot," Bobby replied.
A part of him wanted to tell the Campbells about how long Sam had been drinking demon blood and how what he'd done in preparation for saying yes had merely been the tip of the iceberg, but he didn't. It would serve the boy right to get a dose of his own medicine, but Bobby couldn't bring himself to do it. He knew it was wrong and two wrongs didn't make a right. Doing so would be childish and wouldn't do anything to help Dean or anyone else.
Instead Bobby looked up at Christian and the strangely quiet Mark. "Help me get him on a bed."
"We're going to need a weaker cleansing spell," Samuel stated grimly.
"Yes, we are," Bobby agreed.
One glance at the other hunter was all he needed to see that Samuel Campbell understood exactly how bad this situation was. The biggest question Bobby had now was whether all of this was due to Sam's little trip to Hell with his meatsuit or because of the demon blood. Since he'd already looked at all that he had on Hell, he'd have to focus his efforts on the demon blood and see what he could find. It was a task he wasn't looking forward to as he already knew that whatever he found wouldn't be pretty, not based on what had happened before.
Or on common sense. Bobby still didn't know what had possessed Sam to start drinking the blood in the first place and he wasn't really sure that he wanted to know as it would definitely be something that he didn't understand and would most likely be something so monumentally stupid that he'd want to hit the boy for it. And people claimed that Sam was the smart one. For such a smart man, the boy could be incredibly stupid.
"Well I guess that's it for tonight then," Gwen stated. "You alright to look after him, Christian?"
"So long as I don't have to drive tomorrow."
Bobby tuned them out as he gave Sam a quick once over. Already the expression of pain was fading from the boy's face and he seemed to be slipping into a troubled sleep of exhaustion. He didn't think there would be any lasting effects, so he would go back to his room and begin contacting some of the other hunters and sources he had before it got too late. He was halfway to his feet when he realized that he could actually call an angel for this one. The idea cheered him for a moment before he suddenly remembered what Sam had told him the last time the boy had gotten drunk while staying at his place. Sam had been rambling and ranting about angels when he'd let slip what Castiel had called him when it had been the angel who'd been half inebriated (and wasn't that something he just had the hardest time wrapping his mind around, especially after all of the alcohol he'd seen Castiel consume with his own eyes without ever even appearing to be affected in the slightest).
An abomination.
Now as then the word made Bobby shiver and he suddenly wasn't quite sure if he wanted to call Castiel about this. If it really was something that was that bad, then speaking with the angel would erase all doubt of it from his mind and he wasn't sure if he could take that just now. What did angels consider an abomination? Was it only unsalvageable things? But no, that couldn't be, it had been Dean who'd requested the cleansing and that could only mean that it was necessary for whatever ritual the angel had in mind and they'd not ask for that if it wasn't possible.
The thought gave Bobby the hope he needed to start planning exactly what he'd do next. After all, he'd already failed one of the boys spectacularly, he wasn't about to do so with the other. At least not if he could help it.
Chapter 78
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: up to and including Exile on Main St., AU from the end of season 5
Warnings: AU
Word Count: 3,251
Summary: Sam undergoes the first of the cleansing spells.
PRESENT
Sam's stomach growled loudly as he came out of the bathroom and he scowled. He'd been fasting for forty-eight hours now and he'd had absolutely nothing but water and it was really starting to get to him. The worst times were inevitably when the others left for food, taking turns to go so that he wouldn't be all alone with the knowledge that they were together, eating. Although on some level he was touched by their forethought, he also couldn't help but wonder if perhaps they didn't trust him not to gorge himself while they were gone. Which was totally ridiculous, he could bear a little fast like this, it was hardly anything compared to what he'd suffered down in Hell.
"Ready?" Bobby asked as he looked up.
"Yeah," Sam replied.
While he'd been showering, the others had shoved the beds and other furniture in the room to the side leaving a large space in the middle free. Various symbols had been drawn on the carpet and Sam had a brief thought of how pissed the motel owner would be when this was found after they left, but then he shrugged it off. They should have charged a security deposit if they wanted to prevent this kind of damage. He did make a note to keep the do not disturb sign up until they left, though, as he really just didn't want to deal with the headache this would cause otherwise.
"Well, you've got the place of honor then," Christian joked with a grand sweeping gesture.
Sam merely scowled at his cousin as he stepped past Christian to kneel in the center of the symbols. As he glanced up, he caught the furtive, assessing glance Gwen sent his way and he suppressed a quick smile. He'd been working out more lately and it was more then obvious now that he wasn't wearing a shirt and, cousin or not, he couldn't help but feel proud at having caught Gwen's eye like that if even just fleetingly. It definitely beat the 'delicate features' and 'pretty' comments that Dean's photo had earned his brother.
The thought of Dean darkened Sam's mood instantly. What the hell did his brother think he was playing at, not immediately telling them that the Apocalypse was still ongoing? Had Dean really thought that he and his pet angels could stop it? Even if it had just been Castiel, his brother should have known that was madness, but to add Michael and Raphael to that of all angels? That was just downright insane, even for his big brother and it told him that something wasn't right. Despite all of the crazy, crazy shit Dean had pulled over the years, this was too far, which clearly meant that something wasn't kosher. He just didn't get why Bobby didn't, or couldn't, see it. They must have done something to his big brother to get him to go along with them like this and then managed to twist Dean around enough to turn him against his own family.
It was almost like grooming, Sam realized with a start. Not sexual of course (and even he could admit how ridiculous that notion was in regard to Dean, besides, it would be completely unnecessary, all they'd need was an angel in a beautiful woman and his brother would be all over her like the slut he was), but with Michael himself among Dean's new friends, it didn't take a genius to figure out what the desired result was. How long would it take, he wondered, before they had Dean so turned around and used to following their orders like the good little soldier he'd always been for Dad, that they would do it? How long before they asked his brother the big question? Or were they going to take it a step further and try and twist Dean enough so that he actually begged to be Michael's vessel? With anyone else he might have dismissed the idea outright, but Dean had always possessed this ridiculous need to please those that he latched onto. If they could get it so that Michael was the one that Dean looked to like that, well, then it would happen and probably sooner rather than later. After all, it wasn't like his brother hadn't already tried to give himself over to the archangel before and the banter he'd witnessed between Dean and Michael clearly showed how far they'd progressed from the bitter enemies they'd been before.
Sam was so distracted that he jumped when he felt wet fingers on his back.
"It's just me," Samuel said.
"Sorry, my mind was elsewhere," Sam explained.
He'd completely forgotten about the sigils that needed to be painted onto his back and chest. Well, they weren't strictly needed, but they'd make the cleansing spell stronger so they'd decided to go with them. Sam carefully held still and started clearing his mind. He'd do a few of these low levels spells to get rid of any residual taint from Hell and then they'd be able to do some of the more powerful ones before he'd be ready for whatever ritual the angels had. Christian's earlier words of warning came back to him and he thought about them some more. He was essentially taking the angels' word as far as this ritual was concerned, but he couldn't see what else they could be playing at. Raphael and Donnie Finnerman proved that angels didn't need permission every time they took a vessel after the first time, so they couldn't be trying to trick him into giving Lucifer permission a second time.
So what could it be but what they claimed? Sam couldn't think of anything else that made sense. At worst it was just a scam to win more of Dean's favor and it wouldn't actually do anything to protect him. It was possible but unlikely as the odds of the deception coming out were too high. No, it was much more likely that Michael'd had a taste of his little brother's power and hadn't liked it. Despite all else, Lucifer and Michael had spent months locked together in the devil's cage and Dean's 'Mike' probably hadn't liked what he'd discovered and now wanted to stack the deck against Lucifer. Part of him almost wanted to say tough and refuse to help Michael do it. His own experience with older brother arrogance and controlling tendencies cried for him to not help another big brother do the same to a younger brother and it was hard to overcome. If it wasn't Lucifer and the Apocalypse, he'd do it without a second thought, but it was and he had no desire whatsoever to host the devil in his meatsuit again. Once had been more then good enough, thank you very much.
"You okay?" Samuel asked, finishing up the last sigil on his chest.
"Huh? Oh, yeah, just thinking," Sam stated.
"Well stop it for now," Gwen instructed.
"She's right," Bobby added. "You need to have a clear mind for this."
"I know," Sam replied crossly. "It's just a little difficult at the moment. I went from being free to being in danger of becoming Lucifer's plaything again at any moment."
"Something that'll become even more likely to happen if you don't do this right, ya idjit. Now, suck if up, clear your mind and drink this." Sam pulled a face as he was handed a mug with some kind of viscous fluid. "I'm sorry," the older hunter continued. "Does it disturb your delicate sensibilities?"
"I'm fine, Bobby."
With a second's hesitation, Sam swallowed down the liquid before coughing at the foul taste. It was even worse then he'd imagined from the look of it and he didn't even want to know what was actually in it, something he'd purposefully avoided looking at before as he knew the kinds of things that went into potions of this sort. He was just amazed that Bobby and Samuel had managed to get their hands on all of the ingredients on such short notice and while traveling across the country. They'd decided to head back to the Campbell compound as they had more room there and Bobby and himself had already exhausted Bobby's books on anything Apocalypse related a long time ago. Despite that, they'd known that they couldn't afford to wait as far as the cleansing was concerned and so here they were.
"Though that might just kill me," Sam continued, making faces at the aftertaste. "Are you sure you made it right?"
"What is it with you boys and questioning me?" Bobby demanded. "First Dean and now you. Yes, of course I'm sure. Do you know how many others dare question my knowledge and abilities like this?"
"Dean questioned your knowledge? When?"
"Back when we first summoned Castiel."
"You can summon an angel?" Samuel questioned.
Sam nearly got whiplash as he turned his head that fast to look at his grandfather. To hear Samuel Campbell ask someone else a question about the supernatural was unheard of. On very rare occasions the man would need to consult a book about some obscure little detail pertaining to some creature or lore, but never had he heard his grandfather actually have to ask anyone about it because if Samuel didn't know it, then none of them would. Given the topic, though, it made sense that his grandfather wouldn't know the answer, but it was still a shocking event.
"I actually don't think so, which is probably why it took so long for Castiel to show up," Bobby replied. "I think they know what you're doing, but it's entirely their choice as to whether or not they actually respond and show up."
"So Winchester was right to question you then," Christian deduced.
"We thought we were dealing with some high level demon at the time," Bobby responded and Sam could tell that he was angry. "In which case the spell I used would have been perfect."
"How about we get on with this?" Gwen suggested. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I for one would like to get some sleep and if we're going to do two rounds of this tonight, then we really need to get started sooner rather than later."
With a curt nod, Bobby stepped back and Sam took a deep breath as Gwen and Samuel took their spots at the cardinal points East and West, respectively. Strictly speaking it didn't have to be performed by a man and a woman (and Sam could recall Dad and Dean doing it once though Dean had complained bitterly about having to take the woman's role), but it was best and as they had Gwen, they'd figured it best to do the spell properly. Something about balancing the energies or such.
The incantations were all in Latin and Sam let his eyes fall shut as Gwen and Samuel began chanting, focusing on the words. Almost immediately he felt a mild pain, rather like an itch deep within him and it caught him completely off-guard. Yes, it was kinda good in that it meant that the cleansing spell was working, but they had only just started. In that way it was bad, very, very bad as it really shouldn't be that quick. To make matters worse, the pain quickly escalated into a burning sensation and started to spread within him. By the time that Gwen and Samuel had finished the first quarter of the chant, he felt like his very blood was on fire and it was all that he could do not to scream in pain.
He tried to concentrate on something else, anything else, but failed. All that Sam managed was to become aware of exactly how tense and strained his muscles felt and how much he was sweating. It was like he'd just finished a fierce battle, not merely undergone a small part of a relatively weak cleansing spell. What the hell was going on here? If he didn't know any better, he'd have said he'd been tricked into submitting for something else, but this was Bobby and his family performing the spell, not Dean and his angels. So what on Earth was going on here? Could it really be like Bobby had thought? Could the blood he'd drunk before saying yes to Lucifer still be having an effect? It just seemed like such a ridiculous notion as that had been ages ago. surely that must have worked its way out of his system a long time ago. He definitely couldn't feel it within him anymore and hadn't since he'd first been resurrected. Yet what else could it be?
The fire in his blood intensified until it felt like it was boiling within him and Sam tasted blood in his mouth as he bit his lip in an effort not to scream. Somehow it kept getting worse, spreading to the rest of his body and reminding him of Hell and what it had felt like to be helpless at Lucifer's mercy those few times the archangel had chosen to focus on him instead of Michael.
Were they at the end of the chant yet? Sam had completely lost track and couldn't seem to focus enough on what was being said to make out the words. He couldn't even tell apart the two voices anymore. All he knew was pain and burning.
Finally unable to take it anymore, Sam screamed and collapsed onto the floor in a twitching, writhing mess before darkness consumed him whole.
/
Bobby was ashamed to admit that he hadn't been paying attention to Sam at the start of the spell, but had rather been focusing on Christian Campbell. The man continued to annoy him and he found his dislike for him growing even more. On some level he knew that everything that the man did wrong got compounded by the fact that Dean would never have done it, but he couldn't help but make the comparison. Yes, it wasn't fair on Christian, but the way the man had put Dean down, so easily passing judgment over things he neither understood nor knew the full details of, made it so that he just didn't care. Besides, even if it had, that still left the fact that Christian had made those mistakes in the first place, to mention nothing of his despicable personality.
Regardless, Bobby was ashamed that he'd not been focusing on Sam at such an important time. In his defense, however, he hadn't expected the boy to react quite so badly as soon as he had. Yes, he'd been one hundred percent certain that it would be worse then Sam seemed to realize, but even he'd never seen this coming.
"Stop!" Bobby cried out as soon as the boy collapsed.
"What the hell?" Christian demanded.
"It was too much."
And damnit, they'd hardly finished the first quarter of the chant! Bobby felt fear grip his heart at the realization. If the boy couldn't even take such a low level spell, then what did that say for the condition of Sam's body? For the sheer amount of taint on it? And what about the boy's soul? He swallowed thickly at the thought even as he reached out and gently turned Sam over so that he lay on his back. As he'd expected, the boy was out cold, though his face was still a mask of pain.
"Exactly how much demon blood did he drink?" Samuel demanded, shaken.
"A lot," Bobby replied.
A part of him wanted to tell the Campbells about how long Sam had been drinking demon blood and how what he'd done in preparation for saying yes had merely been the tip of the iceberg, but he didn't. It would serve the boy right to get a dose of his own medicine, but Bobby couldn't bring himself to do it. He knew it was wrong and two wrongs didn't make a right. Doing so would be childish and wouldn't do anything to help Dean or anyone else.
Instead Bobby looked up at Christian and the strangely quiet Mark. "Help me get him on a bed."
"We're going to need a weaker cleansing spell," Samuel stated grimly.
"Yes, we are," Bobby agreed.
One glance at the other hunter was all he needed to see that Samuel Campbell understood exactly how bad this situation was. The biggest question Bobby had now was whether all of this was due to Sam's little trip to Hell with his meatsuit or because of the demon blood. Since he'd already looked at all that he had on Hell, he'd have to focus his efforts on the demon blood and see what he could find. It was a task he wasn't looking forward to as he already knew that whatever he found wouldn't be pretty, not based on what had happened before.
Or on common sense. Bobby still didn't know what had possessed Sam to start drinking the blood in the first place and he wasn't really sure that he wanted to know as it would definitely be something that he didn't understand and would most likely be something so monumentally stupid that he'd want to hit the boy for it. And people claimed that Sam was the smart one. For such a smart man, the boy could be incredibly stupid.
"Well I guess that's it for tonight then," Gwen stated. "You alright to look after him, Christian?"
"So long as I don't have to drive tomorrow."
Bobby tuned them out as he gave Sam a quick once over. Already the expression of pain was fading from the boy's face and he seemed to be slipping into a troubled sleep of exhaustion. He didn't think there would be any lasting effects, so he would go back to his room and begin contacting some of the other hunters and sources he had before it got too late. He was halfway to his feet when he realized that he could actually call an angel for this one. The idea cheered him for a moment before he suddenly remembered what Sam had told him the last time the boy had gotten drunk while staying at his place. Sam had been rambling and ranting about angels when he'd let slip what Castiel had called him when it had been the angel who'd been half inebriated (and wasn't that something he just had the hardest time wrapping his mind around, especially after all of the alcohol he'd seen Castiel consume with his own eyes without ever even appearing to be affected in the slightest).
An abomination.
Now as then the word made Bobby shiver and he suddenly wasn't quite sure if he wanted to call Castiel about this. If it really was something that was that bad, then speaking with the angel would erase all doubt of it from his mind and he wasn't sure if he could take that just now. What did angels consider an abomination? Was it only unsalvageable things? But no, that couldn't be, it had been Dean who'd requested the cleansing and that could only mean that it was necessary for whatever ritual the angel had in mind and they'd not ask for that if it wasn't possible.
The thought gave Bobby the hope he needed to start planning exactly what he'd do next. After all, he'd already failed one of the boys spectacularly, he wasn't about to do so with the other. At least not if he could help it.
Chapter 78