pSam felt the same sense of dread that Dean showed on his face, but he tried to cover it. He needed to be in control of the situation. The little brother wiped the archangel Raphael's blood from his face, careful not to smear it in his eyes. The sheen on his hand was a solemn reminder that Lucifer hadn't just killed his own brother, but the innocent vessel as well. Not for the first time, Sam wondered how many people were going to die to save his and his brother's asses. /p

pBut just as always, the only thing Sam could do was react. Keep up. One thing at a time./p

p "Sammy, you okay," Dean asked, narrowing his eyes and leaning in to be sure that none of the blood that was sprayed across his face and shirt was actually coming from him./p

p "I'm alright," he said, addressing Lucifer as much as Dean when he noticed the angel appraising him. /p

p "Good," Dean answered, grabbing his brother by the sleeve of his shirt. "Then we're going." His glare dared either of them to argue with him. /p

p "Dean," Sam said, pulling his arm free. "I have something going here."/p

pHis brother stared at him, shocked and angry. "Yeah, I get that you think you do, but you shouldn't be anywhere near this guy," he said, never having dropped his gun from its focus on Lucifer's head. "We're gonna go, we're gonna tell Cas everything, and we're gonna work on this together like we always do. Alright Sammy?"/p

p "Because you don't trust me," the little brother added simply./p

p "Look man, if that's what you wanna think, go right ahead," he growled before grabbing Sam's sleeve once more as if he was going to drag him home the way their father used to when they strayed./p

p The grip on his wrist was once again cut short—leaving Sam feeling like his arm was the rope in a tug-of-war game—when Lucifer spontaneously appeared between the two brothers, arms crossed./p

p "I don't ithink/i Sam wants to go with you," the angel said, his tone soft yet bearing a dangerous finality. /p

p "And I don't think I could care less, you evil piece of shit," Dean growled back. He whipped out a new gun, holding it askew so it wasn't aimed in Sam's direction, and fired a round into the devil's head. /p

p Lucifer dropped, and Sam was too stunned to do more than flinch at the sound of the gun going off. /p

p "Come on Sam, he won't be down for long," Dean said, pulling back the hammer on the Colt and getting ready to defend himself when Satan stood again. /p

p The older brother's eyes flicked up briefly and found Sam hadn't moved. "Don't make me knock you out, because I'll do it. I'm fucking serious, Sam."/p

p "I know you are Dean, but...I don't think you can," Sam said regretfully. He didn't like this position he was in. Didn't like having power over the brother who had always looked out for him, always put him first. It felt hugely unfair to not give Dean what he demanded. But for once he was certain it was Dean who wasn't thinking clearly. What their dad had said was obviously swimming around in the elder brother's head, and had been for over a year— "save Sammy, or kill him." It meant that his brother was thinking about their family, when he should be thinking about the human race./p

p And while Sam didn't at all like the cards he'd been dealt, they were what he had to play. He was now wielding the archangel Lucifer like a weapon, and he had to be ready to make good use. /p

p "What?"/p

p "I don't think you can drag me away from here," the younger brother clarified, gentle but firm. /p

pLucifer's body twitched as if it had been shocked, and he gulped in air like a drowning man. After a second, his tension relaxed and he growled, rolling onto his knees and then standing. /p

p It wasn't that Sam wasn't absolutely iterrified/i for Dean. But if Lucifer struck, then he proved himself a liar, and Dean would be resurrected by heaven in days. Despite many flaws, the younger Winchester brother was a skilled tactician, and he knew he was in a position of—admittedly limited—power. /p

p "Lucifer," he said with as level a voice as he could manage, realizing as the words left his mouth that he should probably spare a bit of concern for his iown/i safety "let's go."/p

p The devil shot a winning smile at Dean. "We'll have to schedule another play-date," he said smoothly before reaching two cold fingers up to Sam's forehead and carrying them both away./p

...

pSam was—to put it simply—monumentally confused by what had happened with Raphael. He asked Lucifer for clarification, and again received only a few, fairly evasive answers. First, he had asked why Raphael had called the devil 'Samuel'./p

p "'Samael,'" the devil had corrected. "Another of my names."/p

p The similarity scared the hunter a little, though he wasn't certain why. Having a name that sort of resembled the devil's was nothing compared to the knowledge that he had been born and raised to house him. In the list of ways he was connected to the fallen angel, it should have been the least significant, and he felt childish to be bothered by it./p

p Sam had decided to move past the issue, for the moment. "And what did he think was ironic?"/p

p "I'm not sure," Lucifer had replied flatly./p

p The hunter had summoned his nerves and prompted "Best guess?" /p

p "That I was killing one of my own kind at the request of a human," he had answered after a long sigh. /p

p Sam was a very self-reflective person, and he knew how easily he could be dragged down by power. The interaction with his brother had been too uneven of a playing ground, and his extremely recent failings with Ruby and his iabilities/i made him feel almost nauseous with anxiety at the thought that Lucifer might hurt someone...at Sam's request. Therefore the hunter convinced himself that it would be strategic to simply follow the devil as he instated his real plans, and avoid humanity as much as he could while still learning what Lucifer was organizing. As it turned out, the plans involved the much-delayed visit to the weapon he had been developing. A demon had approached them at the shirt-printing office, all subservience and fear. The hunter had watched with interest as the archangel interacted with the monster./p

p It was not the indulgent, patient Lucifer he had grown used to, nor the taunting and arrogant personality the archangel had shown Dean. It was not even the barely-contained fury he had presented to the younger angels as they were begged for compliance so they could be spared death. /p

p This Lucifer was characterized by unrestrained disgust. Sam felt this might be the angel's truest face—full of pride and disregard for the suffering of those he saw as lesser. It scared and angered the hunter, and it was as welcome a reminder as he could have asked for./p

pThe trip took them to Nevada, to a pharmaceutical company's labs. Lucifer walked them through long hallways dressed with contemporary art and frosted glass windows giving hints of spacious offices on either side. Employees moving through the building bowed out of the way with awe and deference, and Sam realized that they must, of course, be demons./p

p They got to an the end of a hallway and the door in front of them was unlocked with a flick of Lucifer's fingers. The angel gestured for Sam to enter ahead of him, and Sam did so reluctantly. He sat stiffly on the edge of a white leather chair, not feeling nearly at ease enough to sink into the well-stuffed furniture./p

p "You'll be waiting here while I take the VIP tour," Lucifer told him without being prompted. He was leaning in the doorway, his shoulder blades hugging either side of the door frame. Sam watched the devil's face as blue eyes stared lazily down the hall in the direction of approaching footsteps. "Well," he addressed the approaching figures casually. /p

p "We're ready," said a voice that made Sam's brow furrow in recognition. /p

p "Fine. One of you will come with me, and one of you will stay here," Lucifer turned his gaze to Sam "with him." /p

p Sam was snapped out of the consideration he'd been giving the familiar voice by the implications. "What? No. I'm coming with you," he stated. /p

p "Are you?" Lucifer's asked, his lopsided smile audible in his tone. "I can't remember agreeing to that." /p

p Sam was suddenly extremely uncomfortable. Would Lucifer flat-out resist to show the hunter what his game plan entailed? Had he handed himself over to the devil and gotten absolutely nothing to show for it? /p

p "I though you said you'd give me anything I wanted," he declared, ignoring the feeling that he was whining like a spoiled child. /p

p The archangel sighed. "I did. And you idon't/i want to see this, no matter what you seem to think," he was told. Lucifer nodded his head in the direction of the room, and one of the demons in the hallway took the cue, stepping into the room and stopping with a jolt. /p

p Sam wasn't sure whether to hug the man or grab his knife. He settled for simply breathing "Brady?" /p