Reverse Big Bang 2010

"Into the Land of Nod (A Cain and Abel Remix)"

By Evil Day

If you'd like to see the gorgeous accompanying art that lupe-lei did, please visit my profile for a link

Rating: R

Genre: Gen

Summary: Season 6 casefic. Prompt "Something strange happens during a routine hunt." A week after reuniting with his brother, Dean receives a strange phone call in the night.

Warnings: Darkfic, Interpretive character death, hurt/sick Dean, violence, R rated language.

The cool chirp of the low cell phone ringtone swam across the surface of Dean's shallow slumber. With his face pressed against the damp pillowcase, still smelling of laundry soap, he fumbled out a hand in the dark, sliding sleepy fingertips over the smooth nightstand beside the bed. An easy, practiced flip of the phone opened the face and picked up the call, Dean holding it against his ear as he muttered out an answer.

"..mph...-lo?"

The reply was a short, clipped static that repeated itself, like the sound of flipping through several channels, all of which were white noise. Dean frowned and huffed out a surprised breath, blearily sitting up on his elbows.

"Hey, who is this?" he asked. No one answered at first, the line choppy with poor reception, and then in snatches of words and staccato feedback the caller answered.

"...Dea-...Sam, I need you to-...hurry, I'm runn-..." The static became a hard crackle that overcame Sam's voice and forced Dean to pull the phone from his ear for a few precious seconds. Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, he snatched the day's clothes off the top of the hamper as he pressed the cell back to his ear.

"Sam? Sam!" The curdling cold in his belly began to spread out through his veins. "Where are you?" It was too late to worry about waking Lisa, but Dean would have to explain later.

"...-emetery, St. Mary's cemetery, hu-...-some kind of suc-..." The call dropped, sounding as though it had been physically severed. Dean didn't waste another second, yanking on his clothes and hightailing it into the garage. It only took him minutes to rummage through the trunk of the Impala, sorting easily through the retired but religiously cared for assortment of weaponry and tools. Not knowing what he was up against strained the decision-making process, but he thought couldn't go wrong with a shotgun loaded with rock salt, holy water, and a good knife made from pure silver.

Gunning up the engine in the truck made an awful sound in the garage, but Dean didn't think about that. He didn't think about the odd sensation that clung to his chest when thoughts of last week's strained reunion with his brother fluttered across his mind. He didn't wonder where Sam's so-called "family" was when Sam sounded like a taut-strung wire on the phone, or at least what Dean could hear of him. Those were things Dean did not think about. Instead, he thought, Sammy, and flew into the night.

St. Mary's Cemetery and Mausoleum was twenty minutes out on the freeway and another five at least to navigate the back roads. Dean had been there once; it was the closest burial site to his neighborhood, and there had been a memorial service he'd attended about five months ago, Lisa's great Aunt something or another. The catering had been fantastic, and Dean held that fond memory in his mind as he eased the old truck to a stop just outside the large, circular driveway. There was no gate and at least two square acres of lawn interspersed with trees that culmination in a gently a mounding hill behind the white-steepled church on the property, far back on the lot. The mild September night had clouded since Dean had fallen asleep a mere three hours earlier, and the vibrant green of the manicured lawn deepened to a dusk stained emerald in the late hour. Sam's car wasn't in the driveway.

Dean double checked the shotgun, slipping the knife hilt up against his ankle and the holy water in his jacket. Satisfied, he took off into the dark, slipping through flat grave markers like stepping stones and weaving along the cover of trees as best he could. There wasn't even so much as a boot print in the grass. Sparing a brief, fervent hope that he'd gotten the right place, Dean reached a tiny gathering of trees that couldn't really be called a grove, as sparse as they were, and rested his back against the smooth, pale white bark of a birch. The moon was new, a faint, needle-thin crescent like a glowing ring of condensation in the patchy cloud cover that drifted across the sky on some unseen celestial current. It faded from view moments later, leaving Dean too far from the streets for a streetlamp or the glow from the window of a nearby home. His flashlight was safe and sound, tucked away in a toolbox back in his garage and completely useless to him now. Rookie move, he thought, gritting his teeth together as he did his best to scan the area.

He had just been preparing to move forward when he heard something, a voice perhaps, but certainly not Sam's. This one was lilting and bizarre, so faint and feminine it was as though the softly stirring breeze was whispering to him, trying to reach him with a sing-song call. Pausing, he swept the grounds with his eyes in the direction he'd thought he heard it, coming back with just as much nothing as moments before. But still, the sound grew stronger. Now it was clear, less transparent and more like the sound of a human voice, an odd combination of peaceful, rhythmic singing and playful banter in a language that Dean's hadn't heard before, chiming like bells and plucking like tiny, musical strings. He tightened his grip on his gun, willing away the invisible caress on his ears that bled into his mind, dispersing like a drop of otherworldly fluid in a cup of clear water.

Pulling his shotgun up and holding it close, barrel aimed at the indigo sky, Dean stepped forward into the rough circle of trees. There, in a swirl of mist and alabaster smoke the silhouette of a woman took form, graceful and poised, the fog settling until she was fully fleshed out. She was all petite features and olive skin, dark Mediterranean hair that spilled over bare shoulders and shone in the night, reflecting the light of some other place. There wasn't enough moon out tonight.

Dean swore, pointing the shotgun. It was odd enough for a woman to appear from a frail mist, but this one was clad in a simple white dress, thin strap sleeves and a loose fitting cut that reached the cemetery lawn and lingered behind her on the grass, rippling in tiny waves on the autumn breeze. He took aim and shot her in the chest, watching with a grimace as the rock salt flew through her form.

If the action hurt her, she never let on, lifting up a hand in Dean's direction as she opened her mouth again and spoke, her lips moving and forming notes and sounds that weren't words. The shapes she created never truly fell from her lips, carrying on directly inside Dean's skull and painting ideas and thoughts and gorgeous milky moonlight lines that spun and swung and twirled within his head like a whirlwind, dissolving like sandcastles beneath a rising tide and then birthing anew in a captive cycle. How long this went on, Dean couldn't say, but he knew the wet sensation on his face was real, that salt-tinged flavor of tears keeping just a thread of himself grounded in reality. Using that single lifeline, Dean ripped himself from his mind and her spell and dropped to the earth, rolling to her left and deftly pulling the silver knife from his boot. He took a stab at her leg and made contact this time, the tip of the blade slicing through the thin fabric of her dress and cutting into the side of her calf.

As Dean rolled away and jumped to his feet the woman screamed, the fierce, ragged pitch of it tearing out of her throat and scorching the air around them, burning Dean's eardrums like a licking flame. She flung her hair behind her and howled up to the sky, baring blunt teeth that glinted in the dark. Now furious, her delicate features twisted into an animalistic snarl and she turned to Dean and pounced forward, one arm outstretched towards his throat. He ducked, twisting to the side and aiming the knife to her chest but she grabbed his hand and curled her frozen fingers around his forearm. Her grasp was like granite and Dean grunted as he dropped the knife, watching it fall from his twisted fingers and hit the grass with a muted thud. Turning on Dean, the woman forced his to his knees and took up his left hand with the strength of animated marble, bringing it to her rose colored mouth.

"Hey, whoa...wha-" In an instant, Dean's left palm was under her teeth, and even though he knew he'd seen hers and knew they were human, the agony that sprung forth from the touch of her lips was like liquid fire on his skin, melting and charring the flesh there. He willed himself not to scream and the sound punched out of him in a desperate wheeze, choking on his pain as his throat tightened. In a daze he reached out with his right hand, grasping at strands of grass and broken twigs as he combed the ground for his knife.

With a startled gasp, the woman froze, her frigid fingertips unexpectedly slipping from Dean. Wrenching himself away and taking up the knife in one swift move, Dean saw the shadow of his brother behind her, and the silver tip of a knife gleaming from her chest. It was over.

"Sam." Overwhelmed with relief at the sight of his brother for many reasons, Dean watched over the scene cautiously as Sam silently and efficiently pulled the knife out of the woman and watched with detached interest as she instantly dispersed into the night air, billowing out of existence like smoke from a swinging censer.

"What the hell was that?" Dean mused aloud, now alone with his brother in the smattering of trees. "A siren? There's no water around here for miles."

"... No...not a succubus, either. At least, not like any I've ever seen." Sam stepped forward and placed his hand easily on Dean's shoulder, like he'd been doing it for the past year. Dean's jaw tightened and he wiped at his face, drying the faint tear-tracks. "Are you okay?"

"Naw, the damn thing bit me or something. Fuck, it hurts like hell," he groaned, letting go of his injured hand and examining it closely. "What..." There was no burn, nor was there a bite mark. His skin was entirely unbroken. For the level of pain that Dean had felt, he'd been expecting to at least be missing a good sized chunk of skin, but there was nothing. Nothing missing, anyway, but she'd left him with a little parting gift, and Dean brought his hand closer to his face and stared, his brows furrowing.

"What is it?" Sam asked, his voice subdued. "I can patch it up, if you want."

"I don't think you can." Dean showed Sam the symbol that was starting to appear on his palm.

The drive to Bobby's was the longest one in Dean's memory, the stuffed-up silence in Sam's Charger stretching out each mile-long second like pulling taffy. After calling Lisa and promising to keep her updated, Dean slumped in his annoyingly comfortable seat and watched the dawn breaking on the horizon with an uneasy curl to his lip. Dean hated riding shotgun, but this wasn't the Impala, and things weren't as they always had been, Dean and Sam against world, backs together as they tore it apart, one bloody-knuckled swing at a time. Those uneasy but inevitable and strangely dependable moments seemed to be over for good. Squinting at the rising light, he picked at the skin of his palm, looking for tiny cuts, flaking skin, anything at all that would help him to make sense of the incident...and it's lingering signature.

"Dean," Sam started, rolling his words around in his mouth before showing them to Dean. "Thanks for being there. You know...when I called. You could have said no." Dean watched with absent enthusiasm as Sam darted his eyes off the road for a few moments to offer Dean a genuinely thankful face that tipped Dean's inner compass off course, the little red arrow trembling slightly off of his own true north. He gave Sam a cursory nod topped with a grunt, the corners of his mouth twisting downward as a pang of nausea curled up in his belly.

With a nod and some biting but well meaning commentary, Bobby ushered them into his home and listened to the collective tale of the previous night.

"It's similar to a succubus-" Sam started, and Dean cut in to elaborate, an old habit that used to settle down soft in his soul, like a comfort food.

"Yeah, but way more powerful," he finished, nodding at Sam before turning back to Bobby. "Not like any succubus or siren I've ever come across. This one, she..." Dean scrubbed at his face with his palms, the shrink-wrapped sensation on his eyes from lack of sleep less familiar than it had been a year ago. "All she had to do was talk and I was under. Felt like I was dreaming...and damn, she was strong. Coulda thrown me if she wanted to."

"She seems to have, uh...left some sort of mark on Dean. We're not sure if it's dangerous or not." Sam met Dean's eyes as he spoke, searching him for any sign of annoyance or unhappiness like he had countless times before, expertly navigating through Dean's masks and faked pleasantries. It looked the same. It was the same. Sammy, Dean thought, and looked away, eyes back on Bobby. That searching gaze felt foreign somehow, like rearranging the same old furniture in a familiar room.

"Well, lemme take a look, then," Bobby sighed, easing himself off the edge of his table where he'd been leaning and peering down at Dean's upturned left palm. "Hmph," he grunted after a good minute of silent observation, "doesn't look like much. You say she bit you?"

"I- I guess," he replied, tracing the perfectly centered, thin black circle inked into the palm of his hand, maybe half an inch wide. "S'what it fucking felt like," he grumbled, rubbing his palm at the memory. "It all happened really fast. But I watched her open her mouth and bite down right there," he motioned at his hand, "and I swear, it felt like she was burning it right off my arm. But after Sam took her down, we checked it out and it was just like this, no bite marks or burns, or-...what the hell?"

"What?" Sam stood up at the sound of Dean's voice, peering over Dean's shoulder to get a look at his hand. "What...was that there before?"

"Nope...I'm sure. I stared at this dumb thing the whole way here." Dean scratched at the surface skin as if there were dirt clinging there and not some sort of supernatural symbol, fleshing itself out piece by piece to the tune of it's own enigmatic design.

"What the..." Bobby trailed off, taking up Dean's left hand in his own and crinkling his nose in confusion as he investigated the mark. "Now, I know that weren't there a second ago."

The thread-thin circle etched into Dean's palm was now encircled by another, forming the black outline of a ring that sat small and hollow in his hand and tugged at Dean's fraying nerves. Something's wrong, he thought, clenching his fingers and making a fist.

Sam sat back down in his chair, frowning at the floor.

"Well, as strange as that might be," Bobby said as he shuffled around the table, pushing aside stacks of open books and tied parchments, trying to make some room in the clutter and stirring up a small cloud of dust that danced and spun in the strips of sunlight filtering through the drapes, "I think in this case it's gonna help me to figure out what's been done to you." Thumbing through spine-cracked volumes on the tired, sagging bookshelves against the wall, Bobby slid out a wide book with a textured black cover and motioned for Sam to come around. "There ain't too many curses where the symbol shows up one piece at a time, and only one I know of that comes from something like the two of you tangled with." He flipped through thick pages, jaundiced with age, until coming to a stop and tapping at the open book, motioning Sam to look. Dean sat up in his chair, peering over the table.

"Oh," came Sam's answer, sounding intrigued. "Not quite a succubus, I guess..."

"A what? What was it?"

Sam spared Dean a quick glance before returning to the book. "A Lilitu. Kind of like a succubus, but way more ancient. More powerful. Says here a...kind of Sumerian demonic divinity. She seduces men and uses their energy to..." Sam trailed off, reading further. "To create demons."

Dean was out of the chair and across the room in a second, hunching over Bobby to get a better look. "No...what the fuck is this mark, then? That's-"

"Hang on, Dean," Sam admonished, hovering closer to the yellowed page and tracing the line of letters with his fingertip. "That's not it. It's..." he started, furrowing his brow when his reached the end of the page, flipping it over to see the other side and then turning it back. "That's it?" he exclaimed, standing up and turning to look at Bobby.

"'Fraid so." With a heavy sigh and a swipe of his hand under his cap, Bobby fixed Dean with a withered look. "Boy, you're in it bad this time."

"Sam, what the hell is this?" Raising his hand, Dean held his brother's incredulous stare.

"The..." Sam flipped the page back and forth, re-reading it himself. "The Lilitu are Lilith's favored children. There aren't many of them, and they aren't your average demon. They're more like...like powerful entities that roam the earth. They were created specifically to collect human energy. But here it says that the Lilitu are also messengers...they appear to a chosen few to leave their mark on them. No one knows what the mark looks like, and the only documented human to have survived the process was Cain."

Dean blinked. "Cain? As in the Cain? You've gotta be..." He glanced down at the ring within a ring, buried beneath his skin, and shivered, feeling as it invisibly sank down deeper, staining him somehow. "The mark of Cain? Why? Why?" Voice verging on a shout, Dean stalked across the room and into the kitchen, pushing out panic with forced breaths while he stared at the tiny window in Bobby's kitchen, watching the waving branches of a untrimmed tree play with the noontime sun, big and gold and bright. Something was not right inside of him, but it still felt distant, buried deep within him like a fault line just itching for that cataclysmic tremor. Exhaling sharply, he turned and took calculated steps back into the room where Bobby and Sam watched him silently, waiting for Dean to explode. Crossing his arms over his chest, he leaned against the wall and waited for someone else to speak.

No one did. Or at least, not within Dean's time frame.

"Well?" he demanded, giving Sam a petulant look.

Sam bit his lip. "Well...what? We don't really have a lot to go on, Dean. This mark, it's...no one even knows what it looks like."

"What does it do, then? What's it even for? Fuck, Sam, I-..." Unable to catch the end of his train of thought, Dean shook his head and glared at the faded wallpaper, sinking in the quagmire of panic and regret in his gut. He thought he might throw up.

"Dean, listen," Bobby tried, holding his hands up in defeat. "We don't know anything about this. For all we know it could be fixable. No one's saying it's a death warrant."

Looking back and forth between his brother and Bobby, Dean let out a long breath through his nose. "Do you know how to get rid of it?"

Bobby and Sam exchanged a long look. "We'll find something," Sam offered, his pensive expression banking slowly on a hesitant smile that turned Dean's stomach. "Just give us some time. You can call Lisa, can't you? Make up something? Maybe it's better if you don't go back until we find out more about what this might...you know, do. To you," he added.

Dean was inclined to agree, but remained silent. His voice felt heavy, a fishing sinker tied up in his throat, and he slumped back down in one of Bobby's chairs, relinquishing some of his white-knuckled grip from his rapidly unraveling future.

Lisa was painfully understanding, and Dean couldn't help but feel a twinge of remorse over not giving her all the facts. "Got poisoned," he'd admitted, "but Sammy can fix it. We're working on it now, but it might take a little while. Few days maybe...I'll let you know when I'm coming back."

Not when, he thought. If. But he never told her as much.

Now they were two days in, and without so much as a scrap of evidence to show that what Dean had was curable. Sam had stuck to Semetic lore, which was rife with all manner of warding spells and protections against the Lilitu, but evidently those charms had been effective since the ancient Hebrews hadn't bothered to leave behind a remedy for the mark before distancing themselves from their own mythology. Bobby wasn't having any better luck with Mesopotamia, as they were far more concerned with appeasing the Lilitu as a deity. The cloud cover in the sky that night in the graveyard was better explained by their writings, as was her appearance as a mist on the wind, since Bobby uncovered that the Lilitu was connected to dark weather, storms and winds.

"Awesome," Dean replied, beyond ready to wash his hands of the entire situation. "So now we know everything there is to know about the bitch, and nothing about this...darkside hickey she left on me."

Snorting under his breath, Sam buried his face further into his book. Dean scowled, dragging his feet upstairs into Bobby's spare bedroom and collapsing into the musty old floral comforter, the twin mattress beneath him sagging under his weight. It wasn't much past ten, but Dean and Sam had been taking turns between the couch and the rickety old guest bed, and Dean wanted to milk his night's worth out of it. Exhausted, he undressed down to an undershirt and boxers and buried his face in the thin pillow, one arm hanging lazily off the bed.

The faint stirrings of sleep were just beginning to pull him under when he felt something amiss in the room, a gaze on his back, cool as starlight that seeped into his skin and beckoned him closer. Raising his head from the pillow, he turned and saw her, clear and bright and very real, standing at the foot of his bed and shining dimly like a lamp in the night. The same thick, gleaming ebony hair framed her expressionless face, the whites of her eyes like sun-bleached bone, casting off a muted glow that couldn't be coming from anywhere other than within. Panic roiled like a riot in his chest and in his mind Dean reached beneath his pillow to grasp the hilt of the hunting knife that wasn't even there, but his body reacted on it's own, defying him and sitting up calmly, slowly, standing up barefoot on the unfinished wooden floor.

Dean knew that she was the same Lilitu, not only from her features and the slim curve of her spine as she turned to walk out his bedroom door, but also from the shredded end of her pale dress, sliced clean through on the left side from his silver knife. The excess fabric trailed on the floor behind her like a ruined bridal train as his body followed her down the staircase.

The time was later than he thought. They walked past Sam, his brow creased in confusion as he slept, curled up on the couch in the same way Dean remembered from when he was smaller, familiar yet cold in Dean's chest. He wanted to reach out, to wake him up, call out to him and tell him something was wrong but the words bubbled up in his throat and then receded, the momentary impulse fading like moonlight in shadow. It was difficult to worry. A peculiar emotion coiled outwards from his heart, soaking through his limbs like tepid water and rising, filling him up, something tranquil and soothing and entirely foreign. The permanent undercurrent of tension seeped out of his weary shoulders, slow and sticky like cold sap, and gradually he came to understand the feeling. He felt at peace.

The Lilitu led him outside, even footsteps on gravel and dirt until Dean stood at the end of Bobby's long driveway, tall and silent in the night between the salvage yard and the house, two massive black shadows rising around him like pillars. She turned, facing Dean with yards between them, never a muscle moving in her face to denote a single emotion or thought. Like it was tied to a hidden wire, her right hand lifted, arm rising slowly while the rest her was motionless as a statue. Her finger pointed up, and Dean raised his face to the midnight sky, stretched out wide as miles and weaved with bands of stars. The moon had risen to it's peak, still new and hidden save a sallow yellow sliver on the side. That seemed to be what she wanted him to see, and he tried to ask her what about it, but his voice was still caught in a web, useless to him.

Then that wind worn, ancient lullaby slithered forth, her voice like singing crystal on the wind, sending vibrations across his mind that birthed thoughts and images, speaking in symbols. Dean saw the moon rise and set, growing heavy from new to full and then aging gracefully into shadow, one full cycle in his mind. Only one...and then he knew.

Dean fell to his knees as the spell dissipated as quickly as the Lilitu, dispersing on the air in wisps and curls of fluttering ash and mist. Hands were on his face, his shoulders, holding him upright with a strong grip that Dean knew, remembered and internally connected with safety and Sam, and yet now it was all wrong. Sam's touch fermented like fruit in his gut, and he instinctively pulled away.

"Dean, come on...wake up!" Sam sounded desperate, shaking him until Dean realized that his eyes were closed. He'd thought they'd been open since the Lilitu had woken him up. Grunting, he put his hands on the ground beside his knees, blinking the starlight from his eyes and his head, tracking his gaze from side to side.

"...I was asleep?"

Sam sighed with threadbare relief. "Yeah...I heard you walk out the door. You were just...standing here. I've been calling you." Pulling Dean up to his feet, Sam took a step back. "You didn't respond to anything. Then you just...dropped, like a stone. What happened?"

Casting his eyes to the dirt, Dean floundered with his words. He felt like lying, but couldn't figure out why. "It..." shaking off his initial response, Dean met Sam's wide eyed stare. "She came back."

"Wha- the Lilitu? Where?"

Dean dropped his shoulders in confusion. "Didn't you see?" Sam only blinked, shaking his head once. "She...Dude, she was in the house. She was standing right there!" Waving at the place just in front of him, Dean huffed out a breath in exasperation, tearing a hand roughly through his disheveled hair.

"Dean...I swear, I only saw you. You were just, I don't know...sleepwalking. It was just a dream. Come on, it's cold out here." He went to pull Dean inside by the arm, but Dean steeled himself.

"No." The rock bottom tone in Dean's voice made Sam pause. "It wasn't."

Sam considered his brother, dark eyes nearly invisible in the night. "What happened?" he asked, voice reduced to a near whisper.

"So you're telling me all this cause you saw it in a dream?" Bobby asked, the question laced with skepticism. "I don't know, Dean. I wanna find out what's going with ya as much as you do, but...maybe it was just a dream."

"It wasn't a dream," Dean maintained, looking to his brother for help. Sam was unusually quiet, watching the exchange with badly masked anxiety. "Okay, fine." Pressing his lips together, Dean gritted his teeth, preparing a different tactic. "Maybe it was...I don't know, like a vision. Whatever. The point is, this thing got me up outta bed, walked me downstairs and out the door. I've never sleepwalked in my life, Bobby. You know that. I woke up outside!"

Bobby glanced over to Sam for confirmation, and the younger man broke his silence. "I found him outside, just standing there. Eyes closed, unresponsive. Maybe he's right, Bobby. It's something, anyway, and we've come up with a whole lot of nothing so far."

Heaving out a long, resigned breath, Bobby sat back in his chair and eyed Dean cautiously. "How've you been feeling...other than the dream? Been sleeping okay?"

Frowning, Dean nodded his head, sensing the turn the conversation was taking. "I'm fine," he answered, readiness in his voice.

"Now don't go getting your hackles up," Bobby warned, holding his hands in the air defensively. "I'm not trying to say you're wrong, or that the dream didn't mean something. All I'm saying is, we don't know anything about this curse or what it might be able to do. For all we know, it could cause sleepwalking, or crazy dreams. Just...do me a favor and let's not set this in stone just yet."

"Fine," Dean agreed, resting his chin on his hand. "But it fits. It fits...right, Sam?"

Clasping his hands on the edge of the splintering tabletop, Sam raised his eyebrows and nodded in a hauntingly familiar silent gesture that riled up Dean's sandwich stuffed stomach. What the hell? Dean thought, wondering when his uneasiness with his brother's inexplicable return had entwined itself with his appetite. Weird.

"I'm not thrilled about the circumstances, but yeah, if the symbol is appearing in phases, then based on what we know it could have some sort of specific time frame. And the moon cycle was an incredibly important method of measuring time when the Lilitu legends were born."

"So, you got marked on the new moon." Bobby mused, tapping his index finger on the table. "What happens when it's gone around again in what...26 days? Maybe less? What happens on the next new moon?"

No one spoke. Dean traced the new addition to his mythological tattoo with a fingertip, a large triangle whose upper point began at the base of his middle finger, the lower points stretching all the way to the outer corners at the base of his palm, barring the double rings inside. A gift from the night before, and one more marble in the jar that now had a swiftly approaching limit.

Sam broke the silence, shifting in his chair and clearing his throat. "If I had to guess...I'd say that we either have to figure out exactly what this curse is supposed to do, or..."

"Or I'm going right back downstairs," Dean finished, cringing outwardly and screaming inwardly at the mere thought.

"No, Dean, quit it," Sam spat out with a frown. "It's clearly not that kind of curse. There's nothing to suggest that it's-"

"Sam, no one's been able to beat this thing since it was fucking invented! It's demonic, what else could it mean?"

"Quiet, both of you." Leaning forward, Bobby flipped his book shut with a thud. "If, and that's a big, fat if, Dean's dream was correct, then it means we got less than a month before this thing goes sour, and we're not gonna dig any further than that. So listen up- Dean, you tell us anything and everything that's going on with you the second it happens. I want you to keep a close eye on that symbol and let us know when something changes. Sam..." he trailed off, shaking his head wearily, "hit the books." Turning to Dean, Bobby lowered his voice, his tone familial. "I mean it, Dean. Everything's fine with you so far, isn't it?"

Dean nodded, looking Bobby square in the eyes and vaguely wondering if his voice would give him away. The thing with Sam, well...that was probably just a carryover. Something about it hadn't sat right with Dean from the get-go, but that was entirely unrelated to the mark.

He watched Sam silently for a few minutes, his eyes furtively tracking those tell-tale tics of his. Sam was nervous, and his determination evident. Closing his eyes, Dean thought it might be best to cut him a little slack. If this was really how he was going out, the last thing he wanted was to be on the outs with the brother he'd been so desperate to have back.

Three days later, Dean stopped eating.

It wasn't that he didn't want food; Dean was hungrier than he'd ever been in his life, but the sight and smell and even the idea of food twisted his stomach in a knee-jerk revulsion. He drank the bottles of water that Sam placed in front of him, and occasionally gagged back a bite or two of someone's french fries just to keep Bobby's shrewdly aware gaze off his back.

Whether it was due to a perpetual drip-feed of demonic poison or just simple lack of nutrients Dean couldn't be sure, but with each passing day he grew more tired, hemorrhaging energy wherever he went. Holed up in Bobby's murky old house without so much as a meal to look forward to, Dean began to sleep as much as possible, which helped him keep his head on straight until insomnia set in.

Dean was surprised to find that despite the physical setbacks, he hadn't begun morphing into an evil lunatic like he'd been expecting. Now almost two weeks in, he began to question the dream he'd had, wondering if perhaps it wasn't some sort of aftereffect like Bobby seemed to think. It felt so far away, the passion of the moment passed and buried under unsteady hands and waves of dizzy spells that subsided when he sat down.

Red-rimmed eyes set with deep shadows favored Sam's activity over Bobby's, silently watching, motionlessly cataloging his behavior. Dean's memory was in tip-top shape, maybe because he hadn't had a drink in days, and each time Sam shifted in his seat or furiously typed on his keyboard it sent Dean's mind reeling back to better (better?) days. Sam moved to stand and Dean remembered the way he'd stood up and stretched after a long research session in that motel back in Louisiana years ago.

The short shoulder shrug, tipping his head to the side to let his hair fall out of his eyes when his hands were full; and all of them moments Dean had staunchly refused to remember over the last year. Now he couldn't seem to forget, and still couldn't shake that gnawing at the back of his brain that made his right eye twitch and whispered that something wasn't right. Something about Sam poked and prodded in Dean's belly and ate away at his appetite, the way that he was Sam in every way except one, and that single point was so ephermeral in manifesting that it might as well not exist. It was like watching an uninspired performance of Sam Winchester, every move and reaction so obvious and practiced that it ended up in a caricature of his brother. It was exactly right, Sam to a tee, and Dean didn't like it one bit.

"Dean, seriously," Sam sighed, wincing over at his brother from the kitchen. "It's getting weird. Quit staring." Leaning against the wall, he bent over and rummaged through the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. "Come over here and drink this."

Getting out of his seat proved a little more difficult than usual, and before he'd crossed the distance to the kitchen another wave of nausea crept over him and he shook his head. "Not thirsty."

Sam exhaled loudly through his nose, staring pointedly at Dean. "Just this, and I swear I won't make you eat today."

That promise hooked Dean's attention, and he grudgingly took the can from Sam and examined the ingredients. "What is this? Old people formula?"

"Pretty much," Sam agreed with a chuckle, wide white teeth brightening his face. "It's small. Just drink some and go lie down for awhile. You don't-" he stopped, considering Dean's face with a thin lipped stare. "You look kind of tired."

Sam's patented, grossly effective worried look remained fixated on Dean until he'd taken a few nice sized swallows, nodding patiently as Dean passed the half empty can for him to put back in the fridge.

"Hey, Sammy...remember when we were up in Tahoe? What was it we were trying to hunt out in the forest? I can't remember...coulda swore it was a ghost."

"Tahoe...why? That was like, ten years ago."

"Yeah...it's just been bugging me," Dean said with a grin, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, and Sam confusedly smiled back at him. "I know you remember everything, though. Like a fucking computer, that head of yours." Shoving his hands in his pockets, Dean played a casual stance.

"It wasn't in the forest. It was a water elemental, in the lake."

"Oh, yeah...that was it." Retreating back towards the spare room, Dean offered up another shrug and a smile. "I remember, I remember. Thanks," he said, turning the corner and ascending the staircase with a hand on the rail and a scowl on his face.

Under the circumstances, Sam relinquished his claim on the spare room, citing Dean's condition and retiring to the couch each night without a word. Meanwhile, Dean thought he would have preferred the couch himself since he usually got an average of two or three hours of sleep each night, but he knew Sam better than anyone. He might have had good intentions for Dean's comfort and well-being, but he wanted to sleep out in the living room to keep watch, making sure Dean was where he was supposed to be. Dean didn't doubt they had his safety in mind, but the whole get-up was swiftly transitioning from secure to stifling.

His mind wandered in the depths of night, tucked away beneath transparently thin sheets and scratchy, worn blankets. Even thought the temperature was dropping by the day as autumn closed it's slow grip on the earth, Dean would get out of bed, long past the time he should have been asleep, and push up the glass windowpane to let the evening into the room. The air felt so good on his skin, soothing away the tremors, and after climbing back into his bed he could lie and stare into the sky. Counting stars, connecting constellations, and with a morbid fascination he tracked the nightly path of the moon across the heavens, observing each subtle tip and tilt as it journeyed through the deep, dark sky. Tonight the moon was full and round, the alabaster glow pouring forth from it's station and pooling on the wooden floor of Dean's room, casting a slight sapphire hue to his skin.

The long, shoot-like branches of a nearby tree shuffled their leaves in the patient breeze, the red-tipped, brittle leaves startlingly crimson in the shadow of the house.

Someone's dog barked three times and then howled, miles away.

There was plenty of light spilling off of the moon, enough to read by, and Dean rubbed at the skin on his palm. A circle now enveloped the wide triangle, creating a pattern that Sam had thought suspiciously similar to some ancient evocation seals he'd studied before. He mentioned a book, one he knew existed and knew how to find, and made plans to make the trip the following morning. Dean chewed on his lip. Sam would be gone all day.

Moonlight assaulted his eyes in a sudden, violent rush, whiting out the room in a blinding flash, and a pair of icy hands covered his eyes and pressed the back of his skull into the pillow, that telltale stony grip like cold marble brought to life. Wrenching his shoulders, he tried to break free but already his movements were slipping, his body unresponsive to his demands and sinking further into the mattress as though finally finding it's way to a deep sleep. Through the white, empty expanse blanketing his mental landscape he saw forming silhouettes and shadows, shifting into focus one layer at a time like a camera, and as Dean's mind closed in he noticed that it was Sam he was seeing. Sam driving, his car a black streak painted across the horizon, taillights fluttering in lines behind him like red ribbons. Sam sitting at a table in a dimly lit room, and someone else sitting across from him. Talking, Sam leaning over, fingertip touching the table in a pointed gesture. Sam reaching out, a thin, hardbound crimson book sliding across the table.

When Dean thought of the other person and who they might be, his mind quickly responded, his perspective flickering to the left like a wavering spirit and focusing on the face surfacing out of the shadow. Samuel, Dean realized, Samuel fucking Campbell.

The vision wasn't like a movie, the way Dean had always assumed they would be. It was more like flipping through a photo album of someone's day, random shots and glimpses of a time line in color and short bursts of movement that erratically stuttered and flapped by like a butterfly caught in a draft. Sam, tossing a book on the passenger seat of his car and gunning the engine. Sam, stepping into Bobby's doorway with that bright red book in his hand. Dean, sitting at Bobby's table, watching Sam walk in the door with a startled expression.

The pressure on his face released suddenly, and Dean blinked groggily, scrubbing at his eyes and turning his head away from the crisp, clean light of morning.

Sam had been long gone by the time Dean woke up, feeling more lifelike than he had in days thanks to the extra few hours of sleep he'd managed to snag. The images from his dream haunted him, and he hung about the place in a morose cloud, drifting aimlessly from room to room until Bobby finally sat him down in the afternoon and put him to work on the leftover drink that Sam had stored in the fridge. Taking little sips to appease his hovering caretaker, Dean fiddled with his hands like an anxious child until Bobby cursed and sat down at the table across from Dean.

"Dean," he started, pausing to pull off his cap and brush at his hair, "why don't you help me out here and tell me what's rattling around in that head of yours?"

Dean spun the empty can around on it's side, flicking it with a finger when it's spinning slowed. "Tired. Bored, I guess. Hungry as hell," he said with a worn-down smirk. "Not much, Bobby. Why?"

Bobby hummed a bit before responding, dragging a knuckle down through his beard as he chose the words he wanted. "Sam's getting worried about you. Hell, boy, we're both working our asses off here to try and come up with a plan."

"I know, Bobby," Dean assured, placating the older man.

"Well, then, I just wanna be sure everybody here is doing their part. Make sure there ain't anything else going on with you that we need to know about." The suggestive silence that followed had Dean's eyebrows knitting together in confusion. When he didn't offer up anything, Bobby continued, laying his arms down on the table before leaning over them and watching Dean with a practiced informality. "Sam said he saw you sitting on the staircase the other night. Spent the whole night just staring. You remember anything like that?"

The rock in Dean's throat dropped through his stomach. Outwardly he didn't so much as twitch, lazily spinning the can on the table with a swiftly hardening stare. So, Sam had woken up after all. Dean wasn't about to deny it, but the way Bobby was laying it out you'd think that Dean's marble jar was starting to splinter. He'd suspected that it was Sam who was keeping tabs on him when he was supposed to be sleeping, creeping up the staircase with a professional level of silence, closing the open window when Dean managed to grab a few hours of sleep. Well, two could play at that game. Only evidently, Sam could play a bit better, because Dean swore up and down the kid was out for the whole night.

"Just keeping an eye out, Bobby. S'a habit, I guess. One too many nights keeping watch...this whole thing's got me on edge." The smile on his face was easy, the answer at least partially honest, and Bobby held Dean's open face for a few seconds past comfortable before giving Dean a curt nod.

"Just be sure you-" he started, cut off by the brief knock on the front door, followed by a rattling of the doorknob. Sam stepped into the doorway moments later, bright red book in his hands, and Dean sat still in his seat and stared at his brother, feeling the shock pouring outward into his features.

Sam was all smiles and reassuring glances that evening, and once he'd showered and eaten he sat the three of them down at the wide table, pushing the book across for Bobby's inspection. Dean watched, a placid interest in his face and a freezing ache in his chest, willing himself to play it cool until he determined whether or not he was, in fact, psychic or insane. It was one or the other, and with a grim sense of determination he watched Sam excitedly point out pages, leaning across the table to show Bobby the ideas he was putting together.

Dean couldn't find it in himself to take an interest. Of course he wanted out of this mess, wanted the whole nightmare behind him so he could make a beeline to the nearest burger joint and liquor store, but right then all he could think was where the fuck did you go, Sam? Over and over again, like a mantra, cycling through his mind like a snake consuming it's own tail, and it was no surprise that when Sam turned to Dean to ask him what he thought about the book, that's exactly what came out of his mouth, unbidden.

"Where the fuck did you go?" He hadn't meant to say it, and the nasty inflection riding his words hit his ears at the same time they hit everyone else's, and he immediately wished he'd at least said it with a little grace. He tried again, this time with a more gently inquiring tone. "I mean...uh, where did you get this book?"

To his credit, Sam didn't snap back at him, only tilting his head a bit in Dean's direction with a raised eyebrow. "I called around when your mark starting to look like something I'd read about before. Found someone with a copy, so I went to pick it up. I told you last night, Dean."

"Right...sorry. I just, uh...who was it?"

Bobby slid the book back across the table. "Who was what?" Sam asked absentmindedly, skimming through the pages himself.

"Who had the book? Who did you get it from?"

At the insistent questioning, Sam finally looked Dean square in the eyes, searching for something. Keeping his expression neutral, Dean waited, loosening his shoulders and neck slightly so as not to appear tense. "...What does it matter?" Sam asked, frowning a little.

"Oh, you know...it doesn't really, I just thought maybe it'd be someone I knew."

"Well, it wasn't," Sam responded, an air of finality in his voice. "Here, take a look at this." Sam turned in his seat, placing the book on the table in front of Dean and started gesturing at phrases, symbols and seals, and yet still not a word about where the book had come from. Dean felt a pang of queasiness stirring. "Here. Doesn't that look almost exactly like the mark you have? Also, I got some new ideas. I think these letters that are starting to appear in the outer circle are theban. Bobby, do you have a reference for that?"

Bobby stood up and turned to his bookshelves, scanning the titles thoroughly while Sam took Dean's hand and examined the symbol, searching for any new additions. Dean watched his brother's long, almond eyes inspecting his hand, a few strands of uneven chestnut hair curving along the hollows of his sun-warmed cheeks, and suddenly Dean was at war with himself. Sam was Sam, he had to be. Maybe Dean was blowing things out of proportion. But that same, sick intuition that curdled in his stomach like rotten milk rose up, tasting like bile in the back of his throat, and Dean had to know. What did he trust more...Sam's word, or his own instincts?

"Sammy," he said, startled at the pleading undercurrent in his voice. The sound got Sam's immediate attention, and he glanced up from Dean's palm, open eyed with surprise. "Just tell me, okay? I gotta know..."

Sitting back rigidly, Sam dropped Dean's hand and fixed him with an incredulous smile, devoid of amusement. "Are you serious? What is wrong with you?"

The accusatory tone set off Dean's temper like a solar flare, his deteriorating physical state leaving little room for patience. "Damn it, Sam, why won't you fucking answer me? Just tell me and I'll drop it!"

"Because, Dean..." Sam spluttered, obviously thrown by Dean's severity. "It doesn't matter! We're running out of time! Don't you care? This book could be the key to getting that mark off of you before it's finished!"

Standing up from his seat, Dean stalked away from the table and stopped just a few feet away, jabbing a finger at Sam. "If you won't tell me, then I..." Grasping for leverage, Dean quickly realized he had none. Cursing aloud, he turned and clomped up the staircase like a hurricane, furious and unreasonable. Sam was hot on his tail, leaning against the rail and shouting up at his brother's disappearing form.

"I'm sick of you always pulling this shit, Dean! You don't get to do this to me again!"

Dean slammed the bedroom door shut, leaning back against the wood and listening as Bobby talked Sam down, their voices cloudy and warm as though Dean was listening to them underwater. Pinching the bridge of his nose, he slid to the floor, kicking his feet out in front of him. He's never going to tell me, he thought, and futilely tried to reconcile the magnifications from that outcome. Dean didn't like the Campbells, and he sure as hell didn't trust Samuel an inch, let alone the miles that Sam seemed to happily hand over. But why lie? There was no reason for Sam to hide the book's origins, and even if he knew that Dean wasn't exactly partial to Samuel, he wouldn't lie about it. He wouldn't.

There wasn't any more that Dean could do, at least for the moment. Cracking his knuckles, he stood up and went to stand by the window, waiting for the evening to give way into night, when everything became bearable, if not coherent.

Sam and Dean didn't speak for days. Dean's world become colder by the hour, tremors trailing paths across his skin and diving deep into his muscles, shivering down to the bone and setting his body trembling like a rickety old house barely nailed to it's foundations. Despite the impasse, Sam's anxiety remained monochrome, his devotion evident from the daily offerings of fresh water left at the top of the stairs, just outside the bedroom door.

As the curved bow of the moon grew slimmer with each pass across the sky, Dean slowly came to realize that the only relief to be found from his ever increasing symptoms lay in that pale, muted glow. Now that the moon was on the wane and succumbing to the inevitable dark, his meager little bedroom window no longer let in enough light to suffice.

Dean knew from experience that it was pointless to try and sneak past his brother, no matter how soundly he appeared to be sleeping. Sam, too, seemed to resign himself to observing Dean's behavior rather than interfering, watching without a word as Dean walked past him, through the living room and out the front door. On the third night, Sam followed.

The surrounding shadows weighed heavily on Dean's body, feeling like torn leaves wilting on his skin. Perched on bottom weather-worn step of Bobby's front porch, he exhaled in relief, absorbing the thick, celestial glow of the star laden sky and allowing it to soothe him into a state of quiet contemplation.

He heard rather than saw his brother approaching cautiously, easing himself into a seated position a foot away from Dean. Choosing not to acknowledge his presence, Dean focused on inhaling the vibrant night air.

"Dean?" Sam tried, huffing softly when he got no response. "Come on...talk to me."

Try as he may, it was still so difficult to deny Sam anything, even if Dean though that the request might be tainted somehow. "...What about?"

Crossing his forearms over his knees and huddling his wide shoulders against the cold, Sam waited a good minute before responding. "Look...I'm sorry, okay? I don't want things to be like this between us, especially since..." With a brief but obvious glance up to the sky, Sam turned to look at Dean. "The moon will be dark soon. Even if your dream was wrong, I'm really...I'm really worried. Dean...hey, look at me." Dean obliged him, meeting his brother's stare and in that moment he conceded his anger (if not his suspicion), drawn in by the ingrained familiarity of Sam's face like a moth to a flickering candle flame. "You look...Christ, Dean, you look like a ghost."

That got a laugh from Dean, a rasp of a chuckle under his breath, and he loosened up a bit, relaxing into the midnight wavelength. "Like a ghost..." he muttered, toying with the thought.

"But it's not just that. The reason...the real reason I blew up at you the other night was because this just feels too familiar...like that last time we were trying to get you out of something..." Sam didn't elaborate and Dean wouldn't have asked him to, the subject matter too loaded, still soaked in alcohol and just waiting to be held near a flame. "I'm not gonna sit back and let you sabotage all my efforts to get you out of this. Not again. Do you hear me?"

"Yeah, Sammy...I hear ya." Dean rubbed the sides of his jeans with his palms. He did understand. He did want Sam to help him. The split factions of his heart clashed, a bottomless black gash where his sense of security used to be. Sam was the only blood, the only memory he had left, the only thing still standing in this world that kept him tied to the ground and fertile at his roots. No new growth could flourish without his brother's approval.

"Why are you out here, anyway?" Sam asked, a light, casual note between them. "Can't sleep?"

"Mmm..." Dean breathed, wondering what he ought to say. "Not enough."

"Aren't you cold?"

"...Sometimes," he admitted.

That seemed to be enough for Sam, and he was quiet for several minutes, content to watch Dean as Dean watched the heavens, counting the seconds until Sam gave in and opened up his mouth again.

"Here...let me see your hand. Anything new since this morning?" Sam reached out and hesitated, waiting for Dean to unruffle his feathers and meet him halfway.

"Actually, yeah," Dean admitted, "this weird little symbol came up a few hours ago. It doesn't look like the other ones," he said, his hand outstretched. Sam's fingers made contact and the earth dropped out from underneath his feet. Crying out involuntarily, Dean's face crumpled, his head throbbing and his mind ravaged, instantly reduced to a deserted wasteland of horror and desperation. Pain laced through every motion and his body became rigid, like he was expecting a blow. The low grade nausea that he carried with him like a talisman grabbed hold of his stomach and wrung it out like a wet rag, and Dean fell to his knees on the earth beside the porch and retched violently, ripping his hand from Sam's sickening grasp. Almost immediately the godawful feeling of hollow, scraped out subsided, and Dean rounded his back, abdominal muscles taking over and forcing out thin, burning strings of bile and stomach acid.

"Dean..." Sam said, the sound of it reaching Dean at a distance, as though he were calling out from the house even though he was actually hovering right beside him. Just to be sure, Dean shrank away from the source of the voice, holding up a hand as he shook his head, dragging the back of his hand over his face and wiping his mouth with his sleeve. "Hey...what happened?"

Climbing to his feet, Dean teetered a little, waving in the breeze like a trembling reed. He looked at Sam, really looked, peered into his eyes and saw nothing at all save the depths of concern he wore. Nothing that might hint at the reflection Dean had seen within, had experienced, had, for a few moments, been.

Without another word, Dean turned on his heel and went back inside the house, leaving Sam standing outside, his face filled with confusion and, beneath that, fear, a painful curve to his brow that took root in Dean's skull and filled all the cracks inside of him with guilt.

Dean figured he had about two days left until the new moon. Sam moped around the house like a wounded animal, downtrodden despite his success with possibly solving Dean's predicament. His plan was coming together; from what Dean understood it was a take on an old ritual from the dark ages, one that was a perversion of something even older. The grimoire in question had been written by a magician whose reference material was clearly the real deal, and yet the stupid man had used it to devise a ritual that would evoke a Lilitu, trapping her and forcing her to give him the mark, in what he explained as an attempt to gain some form of incredible insight. A ridiculous notion, for sure, but his notes contained enough sound information gleaned from otherwise unavailable sources, and Sam was able to construct a spell of his own. The prep work, however, wasn't nearly as simple, and the ingredient list alone had Sam coming and going at all hours.

Sam's absence suited Dean just fine. When his brother was out, he emerged from his room, sharing a few cursory words with Bobby, who kept him updated on the official plan of action and took away the finished water bottles that Sam perpetually stationed outside the bedroom door. Bobby made no mention of Dean's estrangement of his brother, and Dean offered no explanation. In truth, there was nothing he could say. It couldn't be told in words, and if Dean tried he'd tangle himself up so badly even he wouldn't understand it. So instead, he said nothing.

The sound of tires crunching the gravel and then trailing off into the distance nudged Dean from the bed, the weak mattress springs giving an experienced creak as he eased himself up. He felt the edge of a rib catching under his fingernails as he absently scratched at his stomach, the desire for solid food flown from his mind. Rubbing at the short, scattered bristle on his cheeks, he nearly tripped over his feet in shock halfway down the stairs, aching muscles in his hands rioting against him as he gripped the handrail hard enough to tear it free from the wall.

The Lilitu stood in Bobby's living room, emotionless face trained on Dean with burning eyes that fixated on his own and refused to let up. Dean glanced to the left, then the right, and finally back to the woman, vaguely wondering if Bobby had left with Sam. They were alone.

"What," he said, surprised at the strength in his voice. "What do you want?" The Lilitu said nothing, still as a lake and miles deep, the sunlight shining in from the windows filtering through her like a screen, creating a transparency to her form like rolling mist. She didn't answer, and Dean's trepidation gave way to fury. "You listen to me, you bitch," he sneered, taking the stairs two at a time and coming to a stop mere feet away from her apparition. "You take this shit off of me, and you take it off now." She remained unwavering as always, but under her cold, inhuman exterior Dean could now sense something lurking, swimming just below the surface and reflecting in the pools of her eyes, something not unlike empathy. Enraged further by the very idea, Dean curled his fingers into fists, an impotent threat as he knew she would likely dissolve upon contact. If she was even real at all.

"Fuck you," he ground out, the words catching on the sandpaper skin of his throat like a pestle dragging on the bottom of a mortar. "Fuck you, and whatever your fucking agenda is." Weariness bore down on him hard, pressing on the top of his shoulders, and he sank to his knees at her feet, cursing his own limitations. "All of this is your fault. It's your fault...my brother thinks I hate him."

That elicited a response from her, and like that night nearly one moon cycle past, she lifted her hand like a demonic marionette and pointed, Dean's eyes following until he found what she was motioning towards. There, sitting in a heap beside the front door, lay Sam's duffle bag, still shiny and black and a far cry from the salvation army bags they had toted around from place to place, when they were still Sam and Dean, well over a year ago.

"He left his bag," Dean murmured, glancing back up to the Lilitu only to find that she was no longer there, leaving a single plume of smoke in her wake that twisted in curls and wisps until it was no more. Without wasting a breath, Dean shuffled across the living room and locked the front door, his hands shaking with more than simple fatigue. Pulling the zipper slowly, he rummaged carefully through the contents, shifting things here and there without completely turning everything apart which might alert Sam's suspicions. It was mostly clothes, a few files Dean recognized instantly as cases, a spare laptop charger, some charms and a hexbag, loose change...nothing at all even remotely odd.

Pursing his lips, Dean opened up the first folder, rifling through newspaper clippings and Google map printouts, thinking idly that it was most likely a nut job with an ax responsible and not something supernatural, although they'd been known to investigate less. He replaced it back into the bag and flipped open the other one, just a yellow file with a few map printouts, all of them within mere miles of Lisa's house. Only one page had any information on it, a page from a website Dean wasn't familiar with. Turning it right side up, he scanned the words, assuming it to be some kind of online encyclopedia. He was only a few sentences in when he stopped, re-read them, and read them a third time before his heart escaped him, racing further ahead and sending a flush of blood to his extremities.

He was reading about the Lilitu. What they were, where they came from...what they were able to do. The article was vague and no more informative than the one Bobby had dug up, but it was unmistakeable. Dean let his eyes track back and forth between the paper and the door, knowing that Sam couldn't have planned to be gone for very long without taking his bag with him. His hands shaking, he checked the date on the printout, then hurriedly pulled out the rest of the pages from the yellow folder, matching all the dates one by one. Blinking dry, bloodshot eyes, Dean gripped the pages so tightly they creased around his fingers. Each and every paper in the case file had been printed in August, the bare bones of a case never fully pieced together. Dean had been infected in September.

He stole the file, zipping up the bag and replacing it against the wall by the front door, slipping up the stairs to his room as slow and voiceless as a heavy fog.

Hours later, Dean awoke to a sharp rap on the door, a dull ache in his lower back from falling asleep sitting against the wall. He put his hands behind him, feeling the dogeared corner of the file tucked between himself and the wall. Bobby didn't need to get dragged in the middle of this.

Dean was more than surprised to see that it was Sam, not Bobby, who was poking a curious head into the room through the half open door, scanning until he found his brother sitting on the floor to the right of the open window.

"We need to talk," he said in a monotone command. He shut the door behind himself, leaving no room for argument.

"I'll say," Dean agreed sarcastically, narrowing his eyes at the ceiling. More than anything he wished for the energy to jump up from the floor in a flash, the momentum to take a solid swing in Sam's direction. If he wasn't already dead he was sure his body had begun to decay, wasting away from the inside and robbing him of his equilibrium. He thought he might have a chance at getting a hit in before he collapsed from exhaustion, but it just wasn't worth the effort.

Turning his nose up at Dean's response, Sam stepped forward into the center of the room. "Look, whatever it is you're mad about has to wait. Bobby's out right now, and we have to get you ready."

"Ready for what?"

Sam frowned, taking a closer, guileless look at his older brother. "For the ritual. We're ready. We can do it tomorrow. It'll be cutting it close, but you'll make it."

"...Is there anything you wanna tell me, Sam? Anything about this case you might have forgotten to mention?" Resting his arms on his knees, Dean clasped his fingers together, watching Sam's face drift between confusion and annoyance.

"I...pretty much just told you everything, just now."

"No, no no no." Resting his head back against the wall, Dean kept Sam pinned under his probing stare. "I mean before...before you roped me into all this. Why did you call me?"

"Why? You mean out to the graveyard that night?" Dean nodded, patiently silent as Sam shifted on his feet. "Because you were the only one close enough to get there in time to help me. I had no idea what I was up against."

"No idea?"

Shaking his head, Sam crossed his arms over his chest. "What, should I have? Is that why you're mad at me? You think this is somehow my fault?"

"Not think, Sammy...I know." Reaching behind himself, Dean pulled out the folder, pushing himself to his feet using the wall for support. He tossed the file towards his brother, the yellow flaps opening midair and dropping the small stack of paperwork at Sam's feet. "You wanna tell me what that's about?"

Ruffling through the papers, Sam only raised an eyebrow in Dean's direction, clearly missing out on the most vital piece of the puzzle. "I think this is about you going through my stuff when I'm not around. What's wrong with you?" he reprimanded nonchalantly, filing everything away neatly as though it had no bearing on Dean's situation whatsoever.

Sparks of anger ignited in Dean's chest, erupting in a dark flame that needed no fanning. "What's wrong with me is that my fucking brother lied to me, that's what! You knew! All that time...what if Bobby hadn't figured it out, Sam? Then what?"

"...What? What the hell are you talking about?" Sam exclaimed, throwing his arms out in a wild gesture.

"I'm talking about the Lilitu, Sam. You knew what it was before you called, hell, you knew she was camping out in my neighborhood since August. You couldn't have said anything? You couldn't have told me what was wrong with me from the get go?" Riding a fresh burst of adrenaline, Dean moved away from the wall. Sam backed up with upturned palms, retreating with each step Dean took forward. "I...I don't even understand why you'd do this. What...why would you even lie? You knew Bobby was probably going to figure it out anyway. Why hide it?" It was ridiculous, so much so that just thinking about it logically made the room spin around him uncontrollably.

"It doesn't make sense...does it, Dean?" For someone who had been completely stumped by Dean's accusations moments earlier, Sam had recovered quickly, opening the folder while keeping an anxious eye on his brother. "You know I wouldn't do that," he said, studying the contents of the file briefly, as if refreshing himself on their contents. "What did you read in this file?"

The blank honesty threw Dean, sounding like he really did want Dean to reiterate it to him. "It's...it's your case file, the one you made in August, tracking the Lilitu. Don't..." Dean suppressed a tremor, grabbing his left arm with his right hand to hold it steady. "Don't fucking stand there and analyze me like I'm crazy. Maybe I am sick, all right? Okay, maybe I'm tired, and I haven't eaten since god knows when, but that's...that's got nothing to do with what I read in that file."

"Fine." Sam tossed the whole thing on the bed, combing his hair back with his fingers and staring at the wall for a long, breathless minute. "You think what you want. But that ritual happens tomorrow, like it or not."

Throwing his head back, Dean cackled, the distress hovering in the room like a thick layer of smoke sucking the life out of it and twisting the tone maniacally. "Oh, right. The ritual, the ritual...that you probably planned with your family, right? The Campbells? Oh..." Dean mocked, miming surprise, "you didn't know, did you? I knew where you got that book. Did you tell them about this? About what was happening to me?"

"No." Sam's posture was rigid, hands clenched at his sides like he was resisting his true reaction.

"I think you're lying," Dean spat, tossing the words out carelessly at Sam like they stung his lips. "You told them everything, Sam. About Hell..." The idea still had him grinding his teeth, just like it had days before that ill-fated phone call in the night.

"That's what this is about?" Sam asked, incredulous at the thought. "All of this," he motioned, waving his hands at Dean and the file, the entire room in his frustration, "this is because you're pissed at me for telling them about you?"

"It's about trust! ...Sam...I don't..." Burying his face in his palms, Dean felt his heartbeat pulsing in his left hand, the veins around the symbol beginning to darken, rife with the shadow of the poison feeding into his body. "I don't know who to trust..." Baring his teeth as he hissed out a short moan, Dean wrapped his arms around his middle, staring at the floor in wide eyed agony. "I can't trust myself," he whispered, blinking around hot, saline tears that wavered in his lashes, submerging the world beneath a glistening film. He felt like he was drowning, a permanent wedge driven between he and Sam and an even larger one splitting him right down the middle. "It's...it has to be one or the other, Sam," he pleaded, begging his brother to do something, anything that would bring that hazy, gray area his soul had become into solid, structured black and white.

"Dean," Sam said, resignation in his quiet tone, "just lay down for now. Try to get some sleep. This will all look different tomorrow." Sure of himself, Sam gave Dean a short, tense nod before slipping out of the room, the door clicking shut behind him.

As Sam's footsteps plodded away down the staircase, one by one, Dean felt his resolve growing strong, his will like tempered steel in the absence of physical strength. If Sam insisted on casting that spell, he'd have to find someone else to use it on. He wondered if Sam and Bobby would try anything unsavory if he refused.

The sunlight ruffled through the tree branches just outside his window, undulating a pattern of shadows and brilliant beams across the floor at Dean's feet. Sitting at the foot of the bed, Dean stared at the floor with stinging eyes that refused to close, tracking the path of the sun across the sky in it's murky reflection on the dark, wooden slats beneath his feet. Distantly the sound of Bobby's voice drifted up the staircase, followed by the banging of pots and pans in the kitchen. Someone was making dinner, and Dean could hear Bobby's and Sam's voices alternating, their tone too low for him to pick up anything intelligible. Still, it wouldn't be a stretch to guess that he was the conversation piece of the hour.

"Sam's telling Bobby what happened," Dean said out loud, to no one. "I know Sam," he assured his hands, "that kid can twist a story and pull a face that'll have anyone eating out of his hand. Maybe even Bobby."

He crept over to the closed door, stepping lightly and skipping over the spot where the wood creaked so loudly that anyone in the house would know someone was moving around upstairs. Pressing his ear against the smooth surface, he waited. Sam's voice became more animated, the dull droning sound escalating until it was interrupted by Bobby, an agreeable noise that sounded almost placating. Huffing out a sigh, Dean pushed himself off the door, massaging his brow with a pinched glare. Poor Bobby probably though Dean was off his rocker by now.

Picking up one of the bottles of water Dean had set to the left of the window, he twisted off the cap and took a long, lazy swig, considering his options. By now, Bobby had no doubt heard Sam's re-telling of the duffel bag incident, colored in such a hue as to paint over any suspicion bleeding through, no doubt. The very idea of Sam doing just that tore such an aching gash into Dean, the rapidly approaching reality closing in on all sides still so unbelievable, however inevitable. Sam, he thought, feeling it echo across the ravine within.

Dean wasn't sure what to do. He was supposed to be trusting Sam, so he didn't have to trust himself.

The mark on his palm pulsed with life, feeding off his own essence like a parasitic tattoo. Dean traced all the little symbols and shapes with a finger, not understanding a single one but bound to them closer than anything else, singeing it's macabre design onto his soul, inch by inch.

"You," he started, whispering at his palm, "...whatever the hell you were after, I hope you got it. Why don't you just end this all now?"

There was no response. The Lilitu didn't appear, and Dean felt the too-familiar sensation of hopelessness wash over him head to toe. Turning to look out the window, he watched as the sun edged it's way below the horizon, diffusing solar rays of burnt orange and offering-stain red into the air, a futile attempt to hold off the descending twilight.

"You suck," he murmured, creasing his eyes into the glow, the last stand of the sinking sun. "You fucking blow at this whole haunting thing." Curling his fingers against the pulsing beat in his left had, he tilted the water bottle from side to side, idly sloshing the remaining third around in the plastic container. "And seriously...the mark of Cain?" Chuckling hoarsely under his breath, Dean shook his head mirthfully. "What is this, a bad horror flick?"

The first star of the evening stuttered into life like a worn down engine. Dean squeezed the water bottle so hard the plastic gave a crunching noise beneath his fingers.

"Whatever," he said, louder this time as he turned to face the room. He didn't really care whether she heard him or not. "Finish it," he challenged, well past the point of struggle. "Take the rest, kill me...take my soul. Whatever it is you're after, take it. I'm fucking done. You already have everything I want. You took my life...my brother." Twisting off the plastic cap, Dean held the bottle out in front of his chest and flipped it over, pouring out the contents on the splintering floor. "There," he rasped, still parched down to his core but resigned to his fate. "Take it all. That's all I had. It's yours."

He held out the upturned bottle until every last drop had fallen out, plopping into the thin, clear puddle on the floor and sending ripples shivering across the surface. Crunching the bottle in his grasp, Dean tossed the empty plastic to the side, his shoulders dropping in defeat. The last of the sunlight was evaporating from the air, and as the spare bedroom began to sink beneath the shadows, Dean saw just a flash from the corner of his eye, a familiar reflection in the water at his feet. It lasted only a moment, not even long enough for Dean to double take at the visage before he was shoved back into the wall, mere feet from the open window. Opening his mouth to yell, he felt his breath punched from his lungs as his vision faded, stone cold spindly fingers spidering over his eyes like a web. Sinking within himself, Dean scraped his nails and swung his legs, flailing as his grasp on the world around him rose up, sailing just above his reach.

Held forcibly still, Dean watched as his hands moved independent of his own thought, pushing his body off the wall and taking hold of the windowsill, making sure the top pane was firmly open. He had climbed halfway out the window before belatedly realizing what had happened to him. Holy shit, he thought, she came. Blearily he reached out, trying to work his hands for himself, but the feeling was like swimming through a thick mire, and before too long he let go and sank to the bottom of the pit, almost tearfully relieved to discover that drowning himself into the possession was blissfully rewarding. Dean submitted, descending deep beneath the surface of thought.

He came to suddenly, the sensation like being roughly jostled out of a pleasant daydream. Huddled up in the dark, Dean flicked his eyes frantically in all directions, the sharp feel of gravel and dirt rubbing against the side of his face. Holding his body painfully still, Dean fell back on years of training, learning as much as he could about where he was before turning tail and running like he wanted to. Turning his face slowly upward, Dean saw that he was tucked beneath something low hanging, something that in the dark almost looked a lot like the underside of a car. Hesitantly reaching up, his fingertips brushed against cool metal and he sighed in relief. Peering out from his hiding spot, Dean took a long look in all directions. He was still in Bobby's scrapyard, and judging from the cars surrounding him his body had been dumped off beneath an old nineties sedan parked just to the left of Bobby's driveway. Dean was spitting distance from the side of the road.

What the hell? Am I supposed to leave? He began to shuffle his hips, crawling out from his hiding place, but before he could move more than a few inches he heard the rattle of the doorknob as the front door eased open with a telltale creak. Stilling every muscle and lengthening his breath, Dean watched motionlessly as Sam shut the door and clomped his boots down the porch steps, coming to a stop an uneasy distance from Dean's cover, a matter of a yard or two between Sam's feet and Dean's face. Resting his head on his upper arm, Dean lay still, strung tight like fishing line stretching beneath the weight of a catch.

Sam didn't do more than scuff his toe in the dirt until Dean heard the distinct, small beeping noises of his brother's cell phone.

"Hey," Sam breathed after a long silence. "Yeah...no, everything's still..." Shifting his weight from foot to foot, Sam lowered his voice and spoke earnestly. "Actually, it's getting worse. He's been sneaking around, going through my stuff. I don't...well, he stole one of my case files...I don't know, it was weird, he was so pissed. At me. I'm not sure what he thought...what? ...Maybe," he sighed, sounding unsure. "He had that dream...maybe he's been having them ever since. He hadn't said anything about it...I know. I told him we'd do it tomorrow, but honestly, at this rate," Sam said, leaning back against the very car that shielded his brother from sight, "I doubt he'll agree. And I- ...I know it can't wait. But I can't really guess what he'll do. He's not Dean, not right now."

The hell I'm not, Dean mouthed, not even sparing the chance of Sam hearing him whisper. If I'm not Dean, then you sure as fuck aren't Sam, either. The after-burn of that thought shook Dean at his foundations, and he stomped down on it mentally, grinding it out of sight and focusing on the one-sided conversation above him.

Sam listened, shifting off of the car and taking a few steps in the direction of the house. "Okay. Well...I don't think that door locks. But...yeah, I guess...we could put him in the panic room until tomorrow."

Dean's heart stuttered in his ribcage, the warm blood in his veins coming to a halt before the resounding beat started back up again, this time pumping in huge bursts that circulated wildly and thundered in his ears, almost blocking out the rest of the conversation. If Dean had felt compelled to be still before, now he was riveted in place.

"I will...yeah, okay. You, too...and hey, thanks, seriously, for everything. Yeah...bye."

Sam's feet walked away from the car and around the house, far enough away so that Dean could see the back of his brother's head. Sam paused, leaning over as he looked up at the side of the house for a few moments, then turning and walking easily back inside, closing the front door and locking it from the inside. Dean's body sagged against the earth, his muscles shaking angrily at the stress. The brief respite the Lilitu had given his mind hadn't done much for his body, his limbs trembling angrily at the activity of the evening.

Adrenaline set his veins humming, his pulse pounding in his hand. He waited an extra few minutes, working his mind through his options while waiting to be sure all was clear. If he lingered too long, though, Sam would find his room empty. Cursing as his body retched, Dean dragged himself out from under the car, already a safe distance from the surveillance lights beside the front of Bobby's house. Stumbling as fast as his feet would carry him, Dean broke free of his cage, flying into the night with a face filled with anger and his heart brimming with trepidation.

The moon hung in the sky like black hole, darker than the night all around it and crawling across the stars like a black widow. Without the pale, celestial glow to guide his movements, Dean ran, enveloped in the infernal darkness. It wasn't long before he spotted the car; an ugly, silver boxy thing parked on the curb at the corner of a small neighborhood intersection. Breaking in was a snap, and starting it up even easier. Dean grinned, a mouthful of gleaming white in the dark, and tore off of the curve, fingers firmly gripping the wheel.

He drove through the night, speeding through the quiet, early morning hours. Clouds began to form the closer he came to his destination, and before long, tiny droplets of clear water splattered on the windshield. The dull, thudding ache in his hand began to spread, coiling itself slowly along his wrist and devouring the beginning of his forearm. Glancing down, Dean grimaced at the sight; long, black veins bisecting and interweaving like demonic highways on a map well traveled, fading out a few inches from his elbow and coming to a head at the center of his left palm. There was one blank place left in the symbol.

The house was empty when arrived in the late morning, Ben long since left for school and Lisa gone for work. Dean couldn't have been more grateful, hoping that at the very least their last memory of him wouldn't involve what had actually become of him. There was plenty of time to gear up the Impala and run for it.

Run where? But he knew it didn't matter. More than anything, he needed to cure himself of this poison before it consumed him fully, and he had to do it alone.

Leaving his stolen car a block from the house, Dean cut around the side and entered the garage from the backyard. He went straight for his car, propping open the trunk and checking through his arsenal piece by piece, taking enough time to account for everything. Fishing through toolboxes and drawers, he collected missing pieces, flashlights and tools that had been discharged from service and put to work at more mundane tasks. Now, they returned at the call for duty.

Dean was halfway through a proper engine check when the soft clicking sound of the side door reached his ears, and as he looked up he met eyes with his brother, standing still and silent on the other side of the garage.

"No," Dean said aloud, more of a gasp in disbelief than a command. Walking around the opposite side of the Impala, he defiantly faced Sam head on and reached into the trunk, fingers settling on the hilt of a long hunting knife. "You just...just go back." Panic churned heavy in his gut, reaching out to the fraying edges of freedom that hung just out of reach.

"Dean, look," Sam started, hands up with open palms in a placating gesture. "I'm not mad at you, okay?" Open, honest eyes that only Sam could pull off watched as Dean turned his knife and pressed the point to his stomach, the gray henley he wore barely masking the feel of it against his skin.

"I'm not gonna say this again," Dean said, deathly slow and edged in a rasp. "Get back in your car and leave. Now."

Sensing his brother's distress, Sam backed up into the wall of the garage but no further, watching Dean with a pleading desperation. "Hey," he tried, trying out sweet and calming notes with his voice like keys on a piano. "Okay, I won't come any closer. But listen, Dean, okay? Just let me talk."

"No!" With a furious cry, Dean reached out and grabbed the closest thing, a small can of paint that Ben had used most of on a school project, and hurled in Sam's direction. A flurry of bright white filled the air, staining the wall just to Sam's left with a wide arc of ivory that splashed to the cement floor and sprinkled the door Sam had snuck in through.

"Shit," Sam muttered, lifting his alabaster-stained hand from his face, his clothes lightly speckled with white droplets. "Dean," he sighed, wiping his right hand on his pants and smearing off some of the white paint, "seriously. Just listen to me. We can still do the spell. There's-"

"I'm not doing that ritual, Sam. Not now, not ever." Yelling only exacerbated the hoarseness in his voice, but Dean's hands were shaking and his heart hammering away in his chest, and with each passing second his body seemed to reject his soul just a little bit further. Teeth chattering faintly, he stuck the tip of the knife in Sam's direction, gripping the open trunk of the Impala with blackened fingernails. "I don't...I don't trust you," he moaned, feeling the poison chipping off another ragged chunk of his heart at the admission. "Damn it..." Dean remembered the feel of Sam's hand, the excruciatingly hollow touch, and grated his teeth together so hard his jaw screamed in protest, biting back tears. You're not him.

"...What?" Judging from the startled expression Sam wore, Dean had said the last part aloud.

"I said-" Dean opened his mouth to utter the awful thing into existence, but before he could get the words out, his abdominal muscles cinched up involuntarily and he fell to his knees, one ashy, gray hand gripping Impala and the other one on the ground, the edge of the blade scraping across the cement. Dean heaved up a mouthful of blood and spat it out, a black, festering puddle with traces of crimson that shocked them both. Strained tears escaped his squinted eyes, and through sheer force of habit Dean looked to Sam for help.

"Dean," he said, nearly whimpering with fear at the sight before him. "Dean...you're dying. Just...please come back, okay? I'll tell you anything you want, promise. Anything...there's still time. We can fix this. Just, please, okay?" With an outstretched hand, Sam begged with shining, terrified eyes.

Fixated on the hand offered to him, Sam's old, familiar grip painted milky white, Dean shivered, his eyes darting between Sam's hand and his face, burying a scream of disbelief that threatened to surface and trembled down to his core.

"I've always known," he said aloud in shock, the realization punching him in the gut and dropping him to both of his hands. He looked up into Sam's eyes and wept at the truth, tears dripping soundlessly to the garage floor. "I knew it...from the first time I saw you. You're not him." A strangled sob dislodged itself from his throat, and he stared down at the poison in his hand, shell-shocked. "It's not the mark...it's me. This poison...I did this."

"What? Dean!" Placing one foot forward, Sam leaned towards Dean, ready to descend on the scene at any second. "You didn't do anything! You're sick," he assured, hands outstretched like he could reach his brother from across the garage, a wild look in his eyes as he realized which way the situation was spiraling.

"I wanted it to be you...I wanted it so bad..."

"It is me, Dean!"

Looking up at Sam incredulously, Dean shook his head, slow and meticulous. Every cell in his body thrashed and wailed, singing violently in an animalistic chorus, and he lifted the hunting knife with sharp, emerald eyes trained on his brother. Sitting back and hovering the knife mere centimeters from his exposed, overcast wrist, he watched as Sam took the bait and bolted across the garage, sliding in towards Dean on his knees, his sights set on the knife, not on Dean.

With a burst of motion like frightened birds taking flight, Dean flipped the hilt in his hand and swung the knife outward, slashing a crescent in front of him and cutting clean through Sam's throat. Confusion glazed over his brother's shining eyes and he fell, tumbling forward at Dean's knees, sickly black blood pooling beneath him.

As quickly as it had come over him, the frenzy vanished, submerging Dean into a state of agony so white hot and blinding that he screamed, over and over again until his voice left him, fading into heaving, hot gasps. Hitting the floor hard on his side, Dean curled up, drawing his knees to his chest and his arms around them, his left hand pulsing to the maniacal beat of his heart like the chaotic pounding of hooves on damp earth. Internally he felt the distinct sensation of plunging beneath the surface of a filthy black lake, inhaling the awful stench into his lungs and swallowing it in a disoriented panic, drowning as he fought kicking and screaming, reaching for the surface only to sink lower. Dean fell for miles, deeper than any body of water on earth, plummeting like a rock and grasping at handfuls of dark mire until the will to fight slowly bled out of him. Gasping deeply, his limbs fell limp and he sank, descending so far he emerged on the other side, resurfacing through the reflection of himself and opening his eyes.

The floor of the garage was cold beneath his cheek. Pushing himself to his feet, he looked at his hands, marveling at their steadiness. All the shaking, the nausea, the darkness in his veins...all of it had disappeared. The symbol, however, remained, the last gap filled in and the completed mark burned black into his skin, lines as clean as needlework. Dean shook his head, shock and relief mingling in his chest. He'd done it. He survived.

With a swift, sure movement, Dean whipped the cover off the Impala, using it to wrap up the body. It took several minutes for him to get it safely tucked into the backseat. He would take it with him, drive somewhere far from prying eyes and burn it, an offering of faith to himself, to the Dean he used to be. To Sam, wherever he was, an apology for such a needful effigy.

Dean started up the Impala, the loud, motorboat engine vibrating to life and ripping out the seams of the peaceful, familial neighborhood air. Rolling down his window, he sat, his back against the seat and his hands clasping reverently at the wheel. It wasn't long, Dean waiting in the driver's seat and relishing the feel of the Impala all around him, before Lisa opened the wide garage door, walking inside to investigate the sound. He'd known she would come.

She didn't approach him, instead standing frightened and small in the center of the garage. Whether it was from his sudden reappearance, the look on his face, or the mess at her feet, he couldn't say.

"Where are you going?" He almost couldn't hear her over the sound of the engine.

"...To find Sam."

Easing the Impala into gear, he drove. Hours became states, the highway stretching out as wide as the heavens just like Dean remembered, each map marker that sped by connected to the rest like bands of stars, constellations of towns and cities that he no longer had any use for. The new moon broke over the horizon, guiding Dean through the shadows, past the last point of light and out of the sight of God.

End