Title: 7.) Episode 1.07: "Because I See"
Description: (Original airdate: September 12th, 2008)
Sam451823 - December 5, 2008 02:23 AM (GMT)
It was dark outside. Sam lay down on his crappy mattress in his crappy hotel room. The place was so disgustingly cheap that most people would pay so that they didn’t get to stay there. An inch of dust covered every surface. The electricity refused to work even for the smallest object that uses it. And worst of all, Sam could swear that the night before, he had seen a rat jog across the hardwood floor.
Ruby then came waltzing in with that smug smile that so suits her. “Whatcha up to, Sammy?”
Sam was so tired of her using that nickname. He simply said, “Nothing.”
“Let me guess,” she began. “You’re thinking about how you need to get Dean out of Hell and how, if you could, you’d kill that bitch Lilith with your bare hands?”
“Two out of three, ain’t bad.”
“What was the third one?”
“Oh, nothing,” Sam teased, “nothing at all.”
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Shortly after 1 o’clock in the afternoon, Travis walked in saying, “Burritos, anyone?” Sam and Ruby turned their attention away from the fuzzy television screen to the small box of Taco Bell burritos in his hand. Without letting word come out of their mouths, they both reflexively stood up and grabbed two each. All six incredibly tiny flour tortillas were gone in under five minutes.
“Why the hell can’t we ever eat anything decent?” Ruby complained.
“On our budget?” Sam sent back. “Please. Be thankful for the little bit we do get.”
“What budget, Sam? We use false credit cards for everything! Why can’t some of that non-existent moolah go towards a halfway decent meal that we haven’t had millions of times?!”
“Travis? A hand here please?”
“Actually,” Travis said. “I’m with Ruby here, man.”
“Thank you,” Ruby said with an actual smile now arched across her face. “Two against one, Sammy. We win, you lose.”
“Hey, if you guys want to spend obscene amounts of money that we don’t have and risk getting Potter and the feds back on our trail, then by all means, go out and get yourselves some nice juicy steaks.”
“See? Now was that so hard?” Ruby mocked.
The anger boiled up in Sam’s face. He screamed. “I WAS BEING SARCASTIC!”
Travis and Ruby stared at him. “Damn, dude, what’s eating you up?” Travis finally said.
Sam seemed to calm down a little bit. “I… I don’t know.” Suddenly, Sam grabbed his forehead, scrunched his eyes, and went down to the ground. He writhed around in immense pain as Ruby and Travis stood quickly and ran over to him.
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Sam stood in a cave. In front of him was Carson. To his left was Ruby. And to his right was Travis.
“Do you really think you’re going to get that stone?” Carson asked them.
What stone? Sam found himself thinking. “Yeah, we do,” he found himself saying. “It’s ours Carson whether you like it or not.”
Travis had two crossbows in his hands, one in each. Sam had made the arrows for them himself. They were fashioned out of Palo Santo. Holy wood. Travis fired the arrows at Carson who seemed to know they were coming because he dodged them with ease. “Is that all you’ve got?” He confidently returned.
“We’re just getting started you son of a bitch,” Ruby said.
“Oh, and like you’re any different?” Carson finished with as Ruby started on him with her blade. Carson grabbed her wrist, twisted it around, and shoved the half-foot blade right through her chest. Sam and Travis looked on as Ruby’s host body’s eyes sparked showing that the demon inside had died and then fell lifeless in Carson’s arms signaling that she was dead as well.
“RUBY!” Sam yelled. Travis charged forward and attempted to kill the demon on the other side of the cavern. He fired several more arrows, but Carson used his telekinesis to send them back at Travis. Four missed. One went through his gut. One went through his left shoulder. The last one went directly through his heart. Sam looked at Carson through the holes in Travis’ body and then directly at him as Travis fell to the ground, dead. “I’ll murder you, you bastard!”
Sam darted across the room at Carson. He was stopped, blinded, by a lingering amber light. As the light vanished, a green stone dropped from where it had emanated from. Each man looked at the other, and then looked at the rock, then back at each other. Sam dove for it and had it held in his fingers. He could feel Carson tugging at it with his telekinesis, but Sam refused to let go. It finally flew out of Sam’s hands and into Carson’s. He smirked at Sam. “Thanks, Winchester. Much obliged. I truly am sorry about your friends, but let’s face it. You were too good for them anyway.”
Sam lunged at the demon, but missed as he faded into nothingness.
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Sam jerked about wildly and finally shot upward. His eyes sprung open. He found Travis and Ruby alive and standing next to him. “What the hell was that?” Travis asked, not believing his own eyes.
“He just had a vision,” Ruby said blankly.
Sam looked at the two of them. Impassively, he said, “And I just saw you two die.”
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Opening Credits roll:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_AqUE4ywfQ
Theme Song: “Bring Me to Life,” Evanscence
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Chapter One:
Sam awoke with a start. His vision kept haunting his dreams, had so since he had the damn thing two nights ago. Sam had been searching for leads on that stone, but didn’t find squat. He needed help, but wanted desperately not to have to bring Ruby or Travis into it. He needed help, but wanted them to survive.
He climbed out of his bed and over to his laptop. Opening his laptop, Sam went straight to Google to begin his search. He had run this search every moment that Ruby and Travis weren’t near him. This is the first time he had attempted it with Travis sleeping in a bed right behind him.
The search came up as usual, nothing. He didn’t expect it to do anything different. How many results should come up for “Green, oval stone; emits amber light?”
Sam shut his laptop quietly, but left the webpage open. Maybe he’ll come back to it later.
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No ring tone, only vibration. Sam’s new phone slid across the bedside table and as it fell off, he caught it and flipped it open. “Hello?” He asked quietly.
“Hello, Sammy,” Carson said from the other end of the line. “What’s new?”
Sam walked out of the hotel room onto the balcony. “What do you want?”
“That’s very rude, Sam. Nothing else. Just cutting right to the chase?”
“I’m about to cut right to the hang up if you don’t get to what you called for.”
“Well now maybe I don’t wanna tell you anymore. Now that you’ve gone and hurt my feelings.”
“Good-bye, Carson,” Sam said.
“Ok, ok,” Carson quickly reiterated. “I know you’ve gotten a vision and I want to help.”
“And just how many times have you wanted to help me?”
“Point taken, Sam, but I’m serious this time around. I know you’re looking for that stone and I know where it is gonna pop up next.”
“Give me one reason that I should believe anything you say,” Sam told the demon.
“I can’t, I don’t have one. But I know you saw it come up in a cave and I can tell you exactly where that cave is. And I can tell you what the stone is.”
“Can you tell me what else I saw?”
Carson grew quiet. “That I killed Ruby and Travis.”
“Very good,” Sam complimented. “So I take it that you see the shades of grey here?”
“Sam, I know you don’t have a reason to trust me. Like I said, I don’t have a reason for you either especially after what I did to Ruby in Seattle and to Travis in North Carolina. You think I’m a monster, but I’m not. I do what I must do to survive as only the strongest will.”
These words hit Sam hard. He never felt like Carson would be like this. Carson was basically pleading for one man to trust the other. “What’s it called?”
“It’s called the Vicis Oculus, the Time’s Eye. It’s a magic jewel that allows its master to manipulate time anyway he chooses. Right now, it’s looking for a master.”
“And that master is me? Naturally,” Sam said. “Where’s it coming up at?”
“I don’t know the exact details. Somewhere in the Black Hills is all I know.”
“Next stop is South Dakota, huh?”
“If you’ll believe me,” Carson said. “You might wanna hurry too. That is, if you wanna be long gone by the time Ruby and Travis wake up, and I know you do,” Carson hung up on Sam, leaving him with a lot of questions, but a lot of answers.
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Travis awoke the next morning after a fully restful night. He took a quick shower and when he walked out, Ruby was waiting for him. “Try knocking next time,” Travis said.
“Try locking the door,” Ruby responded. “Oh, wait, that wouldn’t stop me either.”
“We did lock the door,” Travis countered. But when he looked around, he realized the other half of the “we” he was referring to, wasn’t even there. “By the way,” he continued, “Where is Sam?”
Ruby looked around the room, and then shrugged. “I don’t know. I figured he was with you.”
Travis looked at her as if she’d lost her mind. “In the shower?” Travis asked, obviously offended.
“Hey I don’t know what you two do in your spare time,” Ruby said, holding her hands up and turning to move towards the table by the window.
“Whatever,” Travis replied, shaking his head. He wasn’t in the mood to argue with the woman. Sam wasn’t here, and by the looks of things, he hadn’t left any kind of note. Nothing on the bed, the night table… nothing. Even if they were running for coffee or to the motel’s offices, they agreed to leave a note.
Travis began to look around, realizing that while all of their clothes and supplies were there, Sam’s supply duffle was missing. The one that he always packed when leaving the car for a case. He kept his guns and major supplies in there that he would take from the car when they left for a site. And it, along with his wallet and phone, were gone.
“Ruby,” Travis said, looking up in concern. “I think he split.”
Ruby looked up from her thoughts, frowning. “Say what?”
Travis moved to the laptop that Sam had left, lifting the lid. As it turned on, he spoke, “His duffle is gone, and so is his phone and wallet.”
Ruby cursed, grabbing Travis’ new cell from the dresser. She dialed and waited, then cursed again as she turned it off. “Getting his damn voicemail,” she said.
Travis figured as much. He pulled up an internet page, loading up the history. He could only hope that there was something that he could find on here. Anything. And by a lucky stroke, there were searches galore.
“He’s been searching like mad,” Travis said. “But it’s only pulling up Google; it doesn’t pull up any matches for what he was searching for, so I can’t confirm what it was. And there’s a map to the Black Hills.” He looked at Ruby in confusion. “What’s Sam going to the Black Hills for?”
“As in South Dakota?” Ruby asked.
“Uh-huh,” Travis said.
By the look on Ruby’s face, Travis saw she was wondering the same thing. Why would Sam be making a trip to the Black Hills? And why would he split without them? Did it have something to do with his vision? It had to. But what?
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Chapter Two
Sam had heard the phone ring. He even saw the caller ID. But he continued to ignore it. He knew it would only be a matter of time before they started calling, started trying to figure out where he was and why he had run out.
They weren’t stupid; they would figure out that he had left because of his vision. That he had left to keep them from getting hurt. But it was the only way. They wouldn’t accept that as a valid reason, but they’d have to deal with it.
And Sam was far from happy about having to go on blind faith, having to listen to Carson. He didn’t trust a damn thing the man had to say. He had given Sam and his friends over to Lilith. Did… something… to him in that warehouse that he still wasn’t sure of. The demon had tortured Travis emotionally by bringing back his son, only to leave him no choice but to lose him again. He forced Ruby into stealing artifacts for him that they still weren’t sure as to what their uses were. He tricked them all multiple times over and backed them into corners time and time again. And now, he was being forced into it again.
And yet… there was something in the man’s voice on the phone earlier that had never been there before. And it was eating at Sam. He sounded desperate. Determined, and desperate. That was it. And it was a strange tone. They were emotions that Sam had, until now, never heard in Carson’s voice. Even now, it was making Sam uneasy.
Yet still, he refused to drop his guard. Not with Carson. He was a demon. First and foremost. Sam had to remember that. ‘Don’t let yourself get suckered in,’ he thought. ‘Not now. You have work to do here, and you can’t do that if you let him mess you with again.’
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Finally, Sam made it into Black Hills, South Dakota. The place was beautiful. Some of the bluest sky and greenest, tallest trees that Sam had seen in a long time. If only he had the time to stop and enjoy things like this when he, Ruby, and Travis were constantly on the road.
The open and green expanses, the tall and rocky cliffs in the distances… just beautiful. You couldn’t buy scenery like this. But sadly, he wasn’t here to sightsee. Forcing his gaze away, Sam followed the directions he was given by Carson when he called back about an hour ago to the Crystal Caves. Apparently, today’s hotspot for supernatural activity.
Pulling the Impala to a stop in the gravel parking lot, Sam got out, examining the building that was the entrance to the cave tours. The stone building held a wooden sign reading “Crystal Caves Entrance.”
Beside it, bright red, white, and blue festive colorings and wooden fencing. An enclosed area held chairs and tables where some of the staff and patrons sat, eating and chatting, happy laughter ringing through the covered vastness. And in the distance behind them all, the brilliant green of the trees in the backdrop just took his breath away.
God, it was so beautiful here.
‘If only Dean could be here to see it…’ Sam found himself thinking.
Forcing himself on, Sam made his way inside, paying the money for the tour and making his way on through. It was time to find Carson.
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"I'll kill him. I swear I'm gonna kill him myself."
Ruby said nothing as she sat in the passenger seat of the rented Lexus, Travis driving at furious speeds towards the South Dakota state line. They were only five miles out and closing. But she couldn't help but find the constant threats on Sam's life coming from Travis to be absolutely hilarious.
Normally she was the one flying off the handle… and loving it, she might add. But she was the calm one this time. But then again, she knew exactly what the situation was now, thanks to digging through the laptop more.
"Relax," she said, sighing as she looked through the windshield.
"Relax?" Travis said, looking over at her with angered and wide eyes. "The man never pulls stunts like this! He has a vision, says he sees us die and refuses to say anything at all about what he saw for two damn days. Then he goes into this macho hero mode of his and decides to go off and do something on his own. Obviously, it was to keep us out of the loop and out of trouble, when he could get himself killed in the process? So we have to rent this lame ass car and cross the state line and chase after him to stop him from doing something stupid? What kind of idiot..."
"He had his reasons," Ruby countered, cutting Travis off. Travis started to speak again, but Ruby held up a hand in protest, continuing. "Stupid plan, I agree, alright? But he had his reasons."
“Well they better be good ones. ‘Cause otherwise when I catch up to him, I’m gonna…”
“Travis, if you don’t shut up, I swear I’ll cut off your nuts and feed them to you, and then finish this drive on my own. Just steer this car towards South Dakota and be quiet already, ok?”
Travis could only grip the steering wheel harder in response, grinding his teeth to fight the urge to say something. Ruby looked out the passenger window, settling into quiet thinking, damn grateful that Travis had decided on keeping his mouth shut. She wasn’t in the mood for arguing for a change. She had too much on her mind… The things that she had found when she dug more on the laptop…what Sam had been searching for...
Damn it. She had hoped that it wouldn't surface again. That it wouldn't look for a new master anytime soon. Obviously it had. And obviously by what Sam had been looking for, it was in his vision. So the new master was obviously him. This kid was in for a lot more that he had to deal with in his life so far. More than he would realize until it was too late. But for now, he would know only what he needed to. Ruby would make sure of that.
In the meantime, they had to get to him and make sure that whatever or whoever it was that killed them in Sam's vision, didn't kill him in reality.
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Sam had traveled in silence in the back of the small tour group for about ten minutes. He had to admit, the place was just amazing. Crags and crevices of every color and shape hung all around him. The misshapen rock formations that were every shade of brown, tan, and gold, almost seeming to gleam with a color that made one think they were about to drip with moisture to the ground.
Sam was ready and waiting any second for a plopping thud of water to hit the ground, but nothing ever happened. In other areas, the shape of the formations and their bright red and tan colors were enough to remind anyone of the stories of the fiery pits of Hell.
And those only made Sam’s stomach tighten at the sight of them. He passed them in wonder, but also in nausea as the tour guide happily described the cave and its history to the group, Sam shuffling on quietly.
As they moved on, he eased himself further back. Taking his time, he made a point to slow down unnoticeably, bit by bit, taking himself a bit further from the group a step at a time.
To the side, he saw the area that Carson had told him about while he was on the phone. A small, isolated area of the cave, away from the main tour. Holding back and ducking behind a small formation, Sam waited for the group to disappear around a corner, listening to the overly perky tour guide continue her spiel, her voice and the footsteps of the tourists’ finally disappearing into the distance.
Peering out around the corner and seeing that it was clear, Sam ducked under the low hanging entrance, climbing over the small rock formations that led into a large expanse off to the side of the cave. Making his way in, he saw an area that looked much different from the rest of Crystal Cave.
This area was much like any other cave would be. Regular colored rocks and stones that water, light, and time did not affect in their shade or shape. A small hole that led out into the open air of the countryside let light into the steep and rocky cavern at the floor base to Sam’s right. Not big enough for anyone to fit through, but enough to let light and air through.
Isolated and rocky area. Only one way out. Typical of a demon to set this place up to meet. And typical of Carson.
“You know that they have replicated human remains on display in this place?” Sam turned at the familiar sound of Carson’s voice. He watched as the demon pushed his way up the rocky terrain through the same entrance that Sam made his way through, gesturing around. “They apparently found them in here years ago. So they replicated them and kept the story going for the tourists. Sick, huh?”
“Kind of thing I’m sure you appreciate,” Sam countered.
Carson sighed, shaking his head. “Not really. I’m more of the natural human remains kinda guy.” Sam scoffed, and also got a little queasy. He had the strangest feeling that Carson was actually telling the truth in that statement. “You really have nothing that would make you happier than to gut me like a pig, huh Sam?”
“Oh, you really have no idea.”
“In a way, I’m glad to hear that.” Carson smiled. “Years ago, the very thought would have made you sick. Even though you’ve spent your life in this, you still wouldn’t have tolerated the thought. But now… it’s enough to make a demon proud.”
“I could care less about making someone like you proud, Carson,” Sam countered. “Now let’s get this over with. Where’s this gem?”
“The Vicis Oculus,” Carson pointed out. “It’s hasn’t stopped by yet, but don’t get your knickers in a knot. It’ll make it’s way here shortly. I’ve been hearing its call all day. Any creature with any kind of power can "hear" it. Even your favorite white-eyed little monster.”
Sam set his jaw firmly in anger at those words. Great. So Lilith would be looking for this too. “And I thought you’d have her under a tight rein with that little candle of yours that you showed us back in Kentucky?” Sam pointed out. “But I imagine that was more crap you threw out too.”
“You really can’t have any clue what I’m doing,” Carson said, rolling his eyes in annoyance. “For being as smart as you are, you sure do fall behind easily. And can be slow on the uptake.”
Now it was Sam’s turn to roll his eyes, pulling out his gun and aiming it straight at the demon. “Kill you this won’t,” Sam said. “But the iron rounds will hurt a demon like hell and leave a mark that will take even your kind a while to heal from. So why don’t you stop talking, and point me in the direction I need to go before I get tired of this and pull the trigger.”
Carson cooed and smiled. “Nice. I like that.” Carson stepped back, leaning against a cavern wall, folding his arms across his chest. “But like I said, it isn’t here yet. The call is getting stronger, however. It’s getting closer. In this area of the cavern. I’m not sure where though.”
“And I suppose that the reason I’m here is to start feeling it out?” Sam scoffed, still keeping the gun trained on Carson. Carson shrugged in a yes, smiling at Sam. “Great,” Sam replied, sighing in annoyance. “Just great.”
“Very good,” he said. “Very good indeed. Maybe you’re not as dumb as you look, Winchester.”
“Well he can be at times.”
Sam’s eyes went wide at the sound of Ruby’s voice coming from the entrance to the cavern. Seconds later, she and Travis appeared, and his throat tightened. Damn it! How in the world had they found him so fast?
“Considering that he isn’t smart enough to wipe his history to get rid of his MapQuest searches, or smart enough to use Adware Virus Scanner on his laptop every time that he uses it,” Ruby continued. “It wipes out every URL that you use, and everything that you type in search bars. I found what you typed in Goggle, moron. ‘Green. Oval. Amber light.’ Ever consider asking me about that? Maybe I know a thing or two.”
“Considering you didn’t tell me about it the last time it showed up,” Sam responded. “The thought never really occurred to me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Oh, don’t give me that. Do you really expect me to believe that this wasn’t the thing that Lilith blew up that train station in Pierre to get?”
"And when it gets here, you need to hand that over to me." Travis laughed at Carson's ridiculous request, but Sam began to tense at the words. The tone in Carson's voice wasn't full of his typical snide or cocky attitude. It was desperation. A need to get the gem and get out. But even though this confused Sam, the situation was now concerning him more than he wanted to admit. They were a few hairs breadth away from his vision, and he didn’t like it at all.
"Don't know what that thing is, slick," Travis said. "But whether you want it or not, you ain’t gettin' it, homes."
"You have no idea what the ramifications are of the gift that you are about to receive, Sam," Carson said. "And you have no idea how many things want it… including Lilith. I explained only a tip of what this thing is. I can take it somewhere safe. Don't make me take it from you to do that." The crossbow clicked as the first arrow was notched, and Sam swallowed in fear for his friends as memories assaulted him.
"Please," Ruby said, smiling wickedly. "Go ahead and try it."
'Guys,' Sam begged in his head. 'Don't do this…’
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Chapter Three:
Everything was already playing out just as it had in his vision. It was just as it had been in the many times that Sam had had them before; like watching a television re-run that he couldn't turn off, couldn't hit rewind on. Carson stood in front of him. Ruby was to his left now, and Travis was to his right, the two having marched up to stand their ground with him against the demon.
God… this was a nightmare.
He had to do something. Had to get them out of there. How was he going to stop this?
“Do you really think you’re going to get that stone?” Carson's familiar words rang out and Sam's stomach knotted in fear. He wasn't going to speak, wasn't going to say what he remembered himself saying from his vision. He would stop this all from playing out the way it was supposed to if he could. Which meant....
Ruby pulled out her knife. As she charged in, Sam jumped in front of her, grabbing her wrist and twisting the knife from her grip and watching it clang to the floor. He couldn't have gotten a more vile and rage-ridden look from her at that point.
"I'll explain later!" He said. "Right now we have to focus on stopping him from getting that stone when it comes!"
Travis aimed the crossbow for the fiend on the other end of the cavern. Time for a little target practice. Moving targets were always so much more fun. He fired and Carson seeming to see it coming repelled the Palo Santo directly at Travis.
“NO!” Sam yelled and swatted them away with his own telekinesis. Things would not play out as they had. The future was never written in stone for good.
“This isn’t a novel that you can rewrite the ending to, Sam,” Carson called. “And this is my favorite scene too. Now let’s take it from the top, people!”
Carson tried provoking them. He tossed some small rocks from the floor of the cavern at them. It didn’t work on Sam. He knew the demon wasn’t on his side. This time, he was ready though.
“It isn’t gonna work, Carson,” Sam said. “The fun and games are over. Now go back to you cozy little corner in Hell!”
“Been there, done that,” Carson yelled back. “And I ain’t going back! I made the mistake of doing this. Of giving up my humanity to become this… this thing. I sacrificed myself to save her! And that bitch couldn’t even utter a simple thank-you! She was repulsed by the very thing that I made myself to rescue her! Well now she’s gonna see what it feels like! As soon as I get that damn stone!”
What was he talking about? Who was he talking about? And what was so important to him about this rock?
Sam wanted the answers to all these questions and then some. And he’d get answers when he could. But for now, he had to focus on the job at hand. Protecting Ruby and Travis at all costs.
And it was as those thoughts passed his mind that the room filled with glow of the prize that both he and the demon were after.
‘Right on time,’ Sam thought as the amber light filled the room. The stone fell from its place in midair.
Carson, Ruby, Sam, and Travis stared at it. “Wow,” Ruby muttered. “I never thought I’d actually ever see it.”
Carson reeled it in with his telekinesis. But it stopped mid-flow. “Too bad for you,” Sam said, his own powers at working, playing tug-o’-war with Carson over that green jewel.
“Hand it over, Sam!”
“Go to Hell!”
The Vicis Oculus made inched its way over to Sam as Ruby made it a three-way with her own demonic gifts. Travis seemed so lonely, not being involved.
He decided he’d do what he could. He fired an arrow at Carson who dodged it with ease, but the second one, he didn’t see coming. He forced it down, but as his misfortune would have it, that moment of unfocused magic was enough to give Sam the stone. It lit up bright and emerald as it had finally reached the palm of its master’s hand.
“Time for you to go, Carson," Sam said, smiling wickedly. "It’s mine.”
“I’m not leaving without that," Carson growled.
“You wanna bet?” Ruby asked him. Carson faded out. “He was bluffing. I knew it.”
Suddenly, something caught Sam around the throat. “It’s not gonna be that easy, my darlings. Like I said, I’m not leaving without that. Now are you gonna hand it over willingly or do I have to take it from your cold, lifeless hands?”
“You know as well as I do that Sam is the master now,” Ruby said. “You kill him, the Vicis Oculus goes poof.”
“Maybe so,” Carson agreed. “But it’ll just seek out a new master. And when I track it down, it won’t be hard to get it from him. It shouldn’t be anyway.”
Sam had reversed the barrel of his gun. Aimed at Carson’s leg, he fired, breaking right through the skin, through and through. Carson screeched in agony which was enough for Sam to break loose. He fired two more times at Carson and after he bellowed something, he vanished again. And this time, he didn’t come back. Grasping his throat, Sam gasped, sucking in a welcomed breath of air as he turned to look at the others. They would EACH owe each other exlplanations. But that would come later. Looking down at the stone in his hand, Sam realized that first, they had to get themselves, and this gem, out of there.
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Epilogue:
Back in Duluth, Minnesota, to get their bags before anybody got suspicious, Sam began conversing with Travis over everything that happened back in South Dakota.
“Why did you guys come? I didn’t want you there. I was trying to protect you. I mean, why did you think I left in the middle of the night? To beat the traffic?”
“Look, Sam,” Travis said. “Things don’t always revolve around you. Carson’s been messing with all of us ever since we met him. It’s our right to back you up and take him down. And if you don’t wanna do that as a team, then fine. But I’m not going down like that. If that bastard wants to get to you, he’ll have to take me and Ruby down first.”
“That’s right,” Ruby said, speaking from the doorway. “I’m not gonna let him open you up Sam.” Sam looked at Ruby in confusion.
“What are you talking about?” She rolled her eyes, sighing in what sounded like defeat as she leaned against the wall, folding her arms across her chest as she looked at Sam.
“That’s what he tried to do," she said. "Back in Lexington. When he had you on the ground. He was trying to open you up. And I don't mean in surgery. Open your head, open your herart...and get inside them both. A person’s heart is the truest thing in their whole being. It’s even truer than their soul. Demons may seek out souls, but that’s only because that’s all they can get at. What they want is the heart. If the heart of a paragon of good were to fall into the hands of a serious asshole… well… it just wouldn’t be good. And opening up a mind like yours?” Ruby laughed, shaking her head.
"What?" Sam asked. "You talking about my powers?"
"Yeah, I am," Ruby responded. "To open the floodgates to any psychic is dangerous. Too much at once can drive them mad. To someone like you? It can be dangerous to everyone around them. Talk about an Evil Sammy."
'Been there,' Sam thought. ''Done that...'
“And you’re telling me this now?” Sam asked.
“Sam, I’m trying here, alright? I’m trying to fight against my instincts, to fight for you instead of against you. The least you could do is cut me some slack. So I don’t bore you with all the details every single time. So what? I’m doing the best I can. I am still a demon, you know?”
Good point. She had a very good point with all of it. And Sam knew it. He was just mad. Mad at the both of them for walking right into Carson’s trap.
He was even madder at himself. He had done the same thing by walking into it. And in fact, if it wasn’t for them, he probably would be dead at this very moment. Rotting away in the Crystal Caves, being the next set of human remains the tour guides found there someday.
“You’re right," he said, looking to the two of them. "I’m sorry.”
“You better be,” Travis mumbled. To which Sam smiled. He deserved that. Standing, he looked at them both.
“If we’re gonna win this war,” he said, “then we’re gonna have to fight it together.”
“Damn straight,” Ruby agreed.
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Out in the Impala, with their bags in the trunk and rear, keys in the ignition, they were finally ready to leave. Carson was slowly becoming a larger thorn in their side than Lilith. And this time wasn’t any different.
Sam turned on the radio which was already set to the classic rock station in Duluth. The disc jockey came over the airwaves. “Next up for all you Duluthians is a little AC/DC. They’re about to take you on a little trip. Down the Highway to Hell.”
Before the song could begin, Sam turned the station. “Ok, enough of that stuff. Dean's the classic rock fan. Not me.”
“Given Up,” by Linkin Park was now blaring through the speakers. This was more Sam’s style.
“Alright!” Ruby called. “Now you’re speaking my language!” Sam grinned despite himself.
With the sounds of Linkin Park leaving behind the essence that Sam Winchester, Ruby, and Travis Sheridan had hit Duluth by storm, they peeled away from the small town, and down the freeway, on their own highway to Hell.
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End Credits roll: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ1kReIspxk
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