Season Three

Episode Twenty-One: Heaven and Earth

By irismay42

Part Two

Mount Diablo, CA

“That’s not possible!” Daisy insisted for possibly the tenth time in as many minutes. “It’s just not possible!”

Dean tried to tear his eyes away from the angrily bubbling lake boiling away in the center of the cavern, but found he couldn’t help but stare at the way the inky mass of water churned and undulated like something alive; alive and very pissed.

“Yeah, I think you might have mentioned that before,” he told Daisy, as the ground lurched violently beneath their feet and more rocks fell from the ceiling. He yanked the girl to his side, covering her head with his arms as chunks of the cavern rained down all around them.

“We need to get out of here,” Sam said. “Right now. This place is gonna shake itself apart and if we don’t end up crushed to death we could end up trapped. Or boiled alive. Or steamed. Or…”

“Barbecued?” Dean offered, just as jets of fire started to shoot up from the surface of the water, reaching up for the cavern ceiling like hellish fountains of flame.

Daisy’s eyes widened as she shook herself loose from Dean’s protective hold and backed up a step. “That’s just not…”

“Possible? Yeah, we got that.” Dean agreed, grabbing the archaeologist’s arm once again and pulling. “C’mon Indiana. Time’s up.”

For once, Daisy didn’t even protest, allowing Dean to pull her away from the lake as if she had no independent will of her own.

More jets of flame shot up from the surface of the water as they turned to haul ass out of the cavern, dodging falling rock while picking their way blindly toward the exit, the ground doing its best to lurch right out from under them.

The temperature was rising exponentially, steam rapidly filling the distance between their current position and the faint sliver of daylight which seemed to be moving further away the faster they ran toward it, the clamorous hiss of water boiling to vapor behind them echoing off the cavern walls as the flames rose higher and higher with each thud and judder of the rocky ground.

Dean glanced behind him once to ensure Sam and Zach were still following, shoving Daisy in front of him as they finally breached the entrance to the cave. He sucked in a welcome lungful of fresh if dusty air, his hand still firmly wrapped around Daisy’s arm as she doubled over, breathing heavily, his grip seemingly all that was keeping her from faceplanting on the cracked ground at her feet.

Under cover of allowing Daisy to recover her breath, Dean held his position at the entrance to the cave until Sam and Zach emerged behind him, himself breathing a little easier when he saw his brother was safe and in one piece.

“You okay?” he asked throatily, Sam only managing a weak thumbs up in return as he coughed dust out of abused lungs.

Satisfied, Dean pushed Daisy in front of him, making his way as quickly as he was able back down the haphazard pile of displaced rock toward Daisy’s dig site, doing his level best not to slide down on his ass.

Although Daisy seemed as sure-footed as the proverbial mountain goat, Dean stumbled a couple of times, the rocks juddering beneath his feet as the ground continued to rumble, steam billowing out of the cave entrance behind them as they slip-slid their way back down onto terra firma.

Well, as firma as it was likely to get with Earthquake Girl trying to shake them to pieces without even knowing she was doing it.

“Well that was fun,” he remarked, trying to catch his breath as his lungs protested the heat and dust with which they’d been assaulted in the last hour. “Remind me to add that to my list of Things Never To Do Again.”

Extricating herself from Dean’s iron grip, Daisy pulled her cellphone from her jeans pocket, holding it up and examining it with a frown, even as the quaking beneath their feet once again began to lessen.

“What are you doing?” Dean enquired as calmly as he was able, glancing over his shoulder as Sam and Zach finally drew level with their position.

Daisy didn’t even look at him. “Getting my legs waxed,” she snapped irritably. “What does it look like I’m doing?”

Dean blinked, stepping back unconsciously before throwing a look in Zach’s direction. “She always this friendly or is it just me?”

“Don’t take it personally,” Zach said, shaking his head as he tried to get his breath back. “She gets testy when she’s scared.”

Daisy shot a glance at him. “I am not scared!” she insisted, clenching her jaw. “And I’m not testy either! I just think maybe we need some help.” She cast a withering look in Dean’s direction. “Professional help.”

Dean nodded. “Oh yeah, you definitely need professional help, sweetheart,” he agreed.

“Dean—” Sam put in.

“She started it!”

“I can’t get a signal,” Daisy announced, pointedly choosing to ignore Dean completely. “And I think it’s time I called a couple of my colleagues from Stanford.” She shrugged, heading off toward the Jeep. “I have a satellite phone in the car…”

Sam made to follow her, but Dean caught his arm, lowering his voice in an effort to avoid Zach overhearing what he was going to say next. “She gets scared, the ground starts shakin’?” he observed. “And now she’s not in danger—at least for now—the quaking stops? All by itself?”

Sam glanced over at Zach, who was following Daisy back in the direction of the Jeep and the dig site. “Pretty big coincidence, huh?”

“Friggin’ huge coincidence!” Dean gestured toward the crack stretching from the dig site to the mountain, and to the bones erupting from the earth along its entire length. “Just like her finding these weird-ass bones just as her funding’s about to be cut.”

Sam sighed. “I guess she was pretty desperate to find something to validate her research,” he conceded reluctantly. “And this is a damn significant find in anyone’s book.”

“Just in the nick of time,” Dean agreed. “I dunno man, maybe this is all a set up—the bones, the cavern, the quakes…”

Sam tilted his head to one side uncertainly. “This is a pretty elaborate hoax, Dean,” he observed. “Especially for someone working alone. I mean that lake? Blowing a hole in the side of a mountain? Seems pretty extreme to me…” He scratched the back of his neck thoughtfully.

Dean sighed, nodding grudgingly. “Little Miss Sunshine over there doesn’t exactly strike me as the con artist type either.”

Sam shifted slightly, his sneakers scuffing the dusty earth beneath his feet. “There’s another possibility,” he hazarded, eyes downcast as he worried his bottom lip with his teeth.

“Another psychic kid, right?” Dean guessed, nodding. “One that survived that flunky Eli’s little Psychic Kid Apocalypse?”

Sam nodded slowly, eyes gradually rising to meet Dean’s. “Like Kyle, or Nathan Cole, maybe? They both somehow escaped Lucifer’s notice when he put an end to Haris’ little science project back in Wyoming.”

“Never heard of a Big Bad called Duffield before,” Dean observed.

“Never heard of a Big Bad called Cole, either,” Sam pointed out. “We still have no idea who Nathan Cole was descended from.”

“Paula?” Dean suggested. “She oughtta get a one way ticket to Hell for that Dawson’s Creek song alone—”

“Dean.”

Dean sighed. “You’re no fun sometimes, Sammy, you know that?” he said. When Sam just frowned at him, he shifted his feet uncomfortably. “Yeah, okay,” he conceded. “So how come Lucifer—or Haris, for that matter—wasn’t interested in Kyle or Nathan?” He grinned brightly. “I mean, seriously, that whole tornado thing Nathan had going on? Was awesome!”

Sam shrugged. “Maybe—” he began slowly. “Maybe they’re from some diluted branch of a cursed family,” he suggested. “You know how we’re pretty much descended right down the male line from those Winchesters—”

“Like the rifle.”

“Uh-huh,” Sam confirmed. “And it was the same story with Alyssa Medina, Matthew Teller, Matthew Ismay, David Mitchum, right?” he added. “Well maybe Daisy’s cursed ancestor lived hundreds, maybe thousands of years ago; maybe her ancestral line has become so diluted that she just escaped Haris’ notice—”

“Like Kyle and Nathan.”

“But she’s powerful enough to cause earthquakes.”

“Dude, if that’s true,” Dean said, “there could be hundreds of psychic kids still out there we don’t know anything about.”

“Yeah,” Sam agreed, the two of them just standing looking at each other as they considered this worrying possibility.

The silence was finally broken by Zach ambling back toward them, his hands stuck firmly in the pockets of his jeans and a worried look darkening his features.

“Hey man.” Sam clapped him on the shoulder reassuringly. “Everything okay?”

Zach raised an eyebrow at the question. “Well, as far as Daisy getting to her satellite phone? Yeah, she’s talking to a couple of guys she knows from Stanford right now—a geologist and a marine biologist. Should be here within the hour.”

“Well that’s good—right?” Sam hazarded.

Zach smiled tightly. “Sure,” he agreed. “But the whole ‘burning lake, girlfriend causing earthquakes’ scenario? Not so much.”

“Look, man, it might not even by Daisy—” Dean began.

“Oh no?” Zach interrupted him testily. “Like when she got mad at me for bringing you guys here and a damn chasm opened up at her feet?”

Sam took a breath. “Sometimes,” he said slowly, “these things run in families.” He glanced quickly at Dean before continuing. “You—uh—know anything about Daisy’s background? Her family? Where she’s from?”

Zach frowned minutely. “She’s from Louisiana originally,” he told them. “Her dad’s a dentist. Does that help?”

“Not really,” Dean mumbled.

“What about her mom?” Sam asked, frowning pointedly at his brother.

“Realtor.”

“No wonder Haris never bothered with her.”

Sam shot his brother a “that’s not funny” look, just as Daisy herself approached from the direction of the Jeep, excitedly waving her satellite phone.

“Got a signal!” she proclaimed, grinning a little maniacally, and Dean couldn’t tell if she was jittery because she was scared or because she was excited. Enthusiasm sparkled in her eyes as she bounced eagerly on her toes. “We got ourselves a little expedition out here, gentlemen!” she burst out. “My colleagues are real excited!” Her attention slid to the side of the mountain, where the steam billowing from the cavern entrance seemed to have lessened. “This is such an amazing find!” she mused. “It could really make my career.” Her voice sounded faraway as her brain skipped ahead twenty years. Suddenly her focus snapped back to the present and to her companions, a huge grin splitting her face in two. “Let’s see Professor Atherton try to cut my funding now!”

Dean exchanged a loaded glance with Sam, who merely shrugged and turned his attention to his feet.

Dean huffed. “Sweetheart, we just watched a hole get ripped in a mountain in case you hadn’t noticed!”

Daisy’s grin widened. “I know! How awesome is that?”

Dean shook his head hopelessly before persevering on regardless. “Kinda convenient, though,” he said. “All of this. Couldn’t have happened at a better time for you, right?”

Daisy narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. “Meaning?”

Dean shrugged nonchalantly. “Well you gotta admit, it’s pretty lucky—you making the archaeological find of your career just as your project’s about to get mothballed.”

Daisy’s eyes flashed and she strode right up to him, hands on her hips and chin sticking out as she stood on her tiptoes and did her level best to get in his face.

While the archaeologist was about as intimidating as a Chihuahua, Dean had to give her bonus points for attitude.

“What are you trying to say, Dr. Venkman?” the girl demanded, her mouth drawn into a tight white line.

Dean inclined his head in Sam’s direction. “He’s Venkman,” he informed her. “I’m Stantz.”

“You know, you keep casting aspersions and I am so gonna wipe that smug smile off your face, pretty boy!”

“Give it your best shot, Indiana,” Dean returned, pulling himself up to his full height and proceeding to loom over her threateningly. “I’m kinda partial to aspersions as it happens. What are you gonna do, make the earth move for me?”

Daisy virtually growled at him, baring her teeth as she stubbornly stood her ground and prepared to launch another verbal assault in his direction, just as Sam stepped smoothly between them, one hand on Dean’s chest, the other on Daisy’s shoulder.

“Whoa, hey, time out!” he insisted, pushing them apart hastily. “This isn’t helping!”

“He started it!” Daisy whined.

“Did not,” Dean retorted.

“Did too!”

“Hey! Kids! Enough!” Sam echoed Daisy’s earlier intercession in his best teacher voice, shoving Dean back a step before turning back to the archaeologist. “Look, don’t you think it’d be better if we pooled our resources here rather than getting into a pissing competition with each other?”

“Yeah, I’d kick her ass at that too!” Dean insisted. “You just don’t have the plumbing, baby!”

Daisy made another lunge toward him, Sam catching her arm and holding her back. “Hey!”

Daisy looked up at him, her cheeks flushing as she breathed hard. “Did you hear what he was accusing me of?”

“He wasn’t accusing you of anything,” Sam assured her, soothingly. “Believe me, Daisy, we’re not making any judgments or any accusations,” he continued, throwing a look in his brother’s direction. “Are we, Dean?”

Dean shrugged. “Nothing wrong with a few aspersions…” he grumbled under his breath.

Sam shook his head at him. “Look, we need to work together here. You two think you can do that?”

Daisy hesitated before nodding grudgingly. “I suppose.”

“Dean?”

“I’m not in kindergarten, Sam.”

“Dean?”

“Whatever.”

“Now kiss and make up.”

Daisy grimaced. “I’d just as soon kiss a wookiee,” she informed him, causing Dean to snort loudly.

“I can arrange that,” he told her, glancing meaningfully in Sam’s direction before turning his appraising gaze back toward the diminutive archaeologist. “Star Wars fan huh? Maybe you’re not so bad after all, Princess.”

“You’re no Han Solo, buddy,” she informed him haughtily, tossing her ponytail dramatically over her shoulder before her expression softened a little bit and her lips twitched into a reluctant smile. “Although Zach tells me you pretty much drive Chevy’s version of the Millennium Falcon…”

“You better believe it, sweetheart!” Dean informed her, matching her grudging smile with a grin that was probably the closest he was going to get to a peace offering. “And much as I love hanging out with you here in—uh—Tatooine, you think maybe we should head back to the Jeep? I guess that’s where your geeky friends will be meeting us?”

Daisy nodded. “I guess.” She paused for a second before turning and beginning the trudge back in the direction she’d just come, leading the way as Sam and Zach followed, Dean bringing up the rear. “But only one of them is a geek,” she added, eyes twitching in Zach’s direction.

The young man sighed. “Everyone loves the tall, handsome marine biologist,” he muttered under his breath. “It’s the hair, right? I guess blonds really do have more fun.”

“Admit it, even you have a crush on him,” Daisy returned.

Zach frowned at her while Sam took advantage of the girl’s improved mood, quickening his pace until he was matching her stride.

“So,” Sam began casually. “Where you from, Daisy?”

The archaeologist cocked a suspicious eye in his direction. “Lafayette,” she replied cautiously. “Louisiana. Why?”

It was Sam’s turn to shrug. “Just passing the time of day,” he returned innocently, and from the look on Daisy’s face Dean wasn’t at all sure the girl was buying it. “So how about your family? They still there?”

Daisy’s eyes narrowed as her suspicions became even more heightened.

Back off, Sammy…

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

Dean had to admit, the expression of innocent enquiry that crossed his little brother’s features just then was pretty damn masterful.

“I was just wondering, that’s all,” Sam explained with a guilelessly dimpled smile. “Y’know, Duffield. Where have I heard name that before? You have any famous or—” he chuckled, “—infamous ancestors I read about in a history book or something?”

Daisy stopped dead, looking up at him as if he was completely off his meds. “Why the hell would you want to know that?” she demanded.

Sam seemed momentarily taken aback, but recovered quickly. “History buff,” he explained with another innocent smile.

“History freak is more like it,” Dean added smoothly, and Sam nodded, grateful for the assist.

“Well you two sure got the ‘freak’ part down,” Daisy muttered, spinning on her heel and resuming her path toward the Jeep.

Sam caught up to her again, seemingly undaunted by the girl’s distrust, and Dean had to admire the kid’s perseverance. “You know, we traced our ancestors all the way back to the Winchester family—”

“Like the rifle,” Dean butted in.

Daisy cast a glance at him over her shoulder. “You must be so proud,” she commented, raising an eyebrow at him before turning her attention back to Sam, who threw her another innocently encouraging smile. She sighed resignedly. “No,” she said at length. “No famous forebears in my family. Or infamous ones.” A lopsided smirk crept across her face as she added darkly, “Well not that I know of.”

Sam nodded, and Dean was kind of relieved his little brother seemed to be letting the subject drop. The last thing they needed was Daisy getting pissed off at them and going all Earthquake Diva again. That kind of “rock ’n roll” Dean could certainly do without.

They trudged on in silence for a few minutes, finally arriving back at the Jeep just as Dean risked asking, “So these friends of yours—”

“Should be here within the hour,” Daisy supplied.

“You think they’ll be able to figure out what the hell just happened in there?”

Daisy hoisted herself up into the Jeep’s driver’s seat, sitting sideways with her legs dangling out the open door. Her eyes shifted to the chasm yawning open from the dig site to the base of the mountain and she shrugged one shoulder noncommittally. “I’m not sure there is an explanation.”

Dean leaned against the side of the car, following the direction of her gaze. “At least there’s no more steam coming outta there.”

“That was too weird, man.” Sam shook his head. “I’ve never seen anything like that—”

Dean caught his eye and raised an eyebrow. “Not since Leicester anyway.”

“What happened in Leicester?” Zach asked a little nervously.

“You really don’t wanna know,” Dean told him.

“I don’t?” Zach didn’t sound entirely convinced.

“You don’t,” both brothers told him simultaneously.

“You know,” Daisy put in suddenly, for a second seeming to be talking to herself before her distant gaze snapped back to her companions and she laughed sardonically. “Maybe this really was the site of Creation,” she said. “Maybe God—or Coyote—or whoever—is angry at us for disturbing such a sacred place.”

“Could explain why it’s surrounded by the bones of angels.” Sam sounded way more serious than Daisy had. He shrugged. “Y’know—to scare the masses away from holy ground.”

Dean huffed. “Not sure there was anything ‘holy’ about what we just saw in there,” he observed. “C’mon, lake of fire? That’s Old Testament, man—”

“As in Hellfire?” Daisy snorted derisively. “You think that was a Hellmouth we just saw? Guys, hate to disappoint you, but Buffy really was just a TV show y’know. And this certainly isn’t Sunnydale.”

“Mmm, Buffy…” Dean seemed to drift off for a second, before suddenly exchanging a nervous glance with his brother. “You don’t think…?” he began, letting the rest of his sentence tail off into a tense silence, Sam worrying his bottom lip with his teeth for a second before replying.

“Like Leicester?”

Dean nodded, the brothers holding each others’ gaze as if Daisy and Zach weren’t even there.

“The earthquakes,” Dean said. “When we were in the mountain. Almost sounded like—” He paused, took a slow breath before continuing. “Almost sounded like somethin’ was trying to bust through…”

“Aw man,” Sam whined. “That was so not fun the last time—”

“Wait.” Daisy held up a hand to silence them. “You guys—” She looked from one to the other, the disbelief growing in her eyes. “I mean, you don’t actually think it’s called ‘Mount Diablo’ because the Devil lives here, right?”

Again, the Winchesters exchanged an uneasy glance, Sam laughing nervously. “Of course not,” he assured her, not sounding quite as convincing as he had clearly hoped to sound.

“What do you think, we’re idiots?” Dean asked, before suddenly adding, “Don’t answer that, okay?”

Daisy raised an eyebrow and seemed about to toss a rejoinder in Dean’s direction, but was cut off by Sam’s cunning distraction technique.

“So why is it called Mount Diablo?” he asked, the sincere innocence once again flooding his carefully guileless face; although from the amount of research Dean had seen the kid do in the last few days, he was pretty sure his little brother already knew the answer.

“You really want a history lesson now?” Daisy asked a little incredulously.

Sam spread his hands in front of him. “We got an hour till your friends get here,” he said with a shrug.

“And, y’know, know your enemy,” Dean added shortly.

“Enemy?”

“It’s better to have all the relevant information before you go rushing into something,” Sam amended, casting Dean a pointed look.

“’s what I said,” Dean protested.

Daisy shrugged. “Well,” she began. “If you really want to know… The mountain got the name ‘Mount Diablo’ in 1805 when some Chupcan Native Americans escaped from the Spanish into a nearby willow thicket, seeming to disappear into nowhere. The Spanish dubbed the place ‘Monte del Diablo’ or ‘Thicket of the Devil.’” She grinned mischievously. “‘Devil’s Woods.’”

Again Dean glanced at Sam, whose eyes had already flickered in his brother’s direction.

“Somewhere along the line,” Daisy continued, “the Anglos misinterpreted the name as a reference to the mountain itself, rather than the woods nearby, and the name just stuck. Certainly, by 1850 General Mariano Vallejo had romanticized the engagement with the Spanish just a little bit. In a report to the California State Legislature, he had the incident taking place on the mountain itself, where he claimed the soldiers saw an ‘unknown personage decorated with the most extraordinary plumage,’ which caused the Spanish soldiers to turn tail and run, believing the Natives had allied themselves with the Devil.”

Daisy laughed at the ridiculousness of the whole story, and Sam and Dean smiled awkwardly whilst exchanging a dark, almost impenetrable look.

“The Devil, huh?” Dean said lightly, still looking pointedly at Sam. “Lucifer right here on this little ol’ mountain?”

“Who’d have thought?” Sam returned, fake smile slipping ever-so-slightly.

Dean barely suppressed a shudder, all traces of humor suddenly gone from his lowered voice. “Man, if this is one of Lucifer’s old stomping grounds,” he said, just loud enough for Sam to hear. “We could be in serious trouble.”

“It’s only a story,” Daisy assured them breezily, glancing distractedly at her watch. “There’s no such thing as the Devil.”

The brothers smiled at her, even as their gazes slid warily to the mountain.

“Right,” Dean said slowly. “No such thing…”

* * * *

True to their word, it was about an hour later that another Jeep bounced along the uneven ground toward their position, kicking up plumes of dust in its wake.

They’d spent the time keeping one eye on the mountain and another on the park, simultaneously looking out for park rangers and civilians alike, neither of whom, thankfully, seemed interested in inspecting the damage caused by the earthquakes. Which was odd in itself, Dean mused, almost as if the trembling had somehow been confined to the area around the mountain itself and no one further afield had felt a thing.

Even Dean knew that wasn’t possible.

A quake the magnitude of the one that had ripped a hole in the side of the mountain? That would have been felt for miles.

Daisy had told them other little snippets of Mount Diablo’s history as they hung out by the Jeep and waited for reinforcements. But when Sam had again tried to wheedle a little more personal information out of her, she had been skillfully evasive to the point of making an excuse to go check out what was left of her dig site, Zach hard on her heels like an over-protective puppy.

Dean didn’t get the impression Daisy was being so evasive deliberately; more like she’d rather be discussing her work than her personal life, and he really couldn’t blame her for that. Not everyone had Winchester-sized skeletons in their closets, but for a lot of people the past, family, these were places they weren’t overly-anxious to visit, especially with strangers they’d met barely a couple of hours earlier.

Dean knew from personal experience that there were chunks of time in his own life he didn’t discuss with anyone, not even Sam: November 1983 for one, and the couple of years that followed. From what he remembered, that had not been the most fun period of his life, much like the time Sam had been away at Stanford.

Of course, there were always reminders everywhere he looked of the parts of his past he’d really rather forget. Like the giant Stanford University logo adorning the hood of the Jeep which squeaked to a halt a couple of feet away from Daisy’s somewhat older vehicle, two figures inside barely visible through the sudden sandstorm churned up all around it.

The Jeep’s passenger alighted and approached them first, a small hamster of a man in his late fifties, with a thick thatch of auburn hair set atop a wide head and little round glasses that magnified his dark eyes to unnatural proportions balanced lopsidedly on the end of his pudgy nose.

He stuck out his hand as he approached them, and Dean couldn’t help commenting, “You called Scooter from The Muppet Show for help?” even as Daisy cast him an irritated glance.

“Be nice. He’s one of Stanford’s top geologists—an expert in his field.”

“Professor Anthony Maynard,” the little man introduced himself, shaking Sam’s hand a little too enthusiastically before moving on to Dean’s and finally Zach’s, who he suddenly squinted up at before wheezing out a rasping laugh. “Oh, but I already know you, don’t I my boy?”

Zach smiled broadly. “Yes sir,” he confirmed. “Zach Warren. I’m Daisy’s—”

“Squeeze, yes, yes, I remember now,” the Professor agreed distractedly, already turning his attention back to Sam and shaking his hand all over again. “And you are?”

“Uh—” Sam began, and Dean wasn’t sure whether his kid brother was nonplussed by the little guy’s odd behavior or merely tongue-tied at finding himself once again in the presence of an honest to goodness Stanford University professor. “Winchester. Sam Win—”

“Ah, Winchester! Good strong family name!” the professor commended him, finally letting go of him, although his body continued to shake even after he’d stopped eagerly pumping Sam’s hand. “So exciting! So exciting!” he twittered, bouncing over to Daisy. “What a day, my dear! What a day! And what a find! A hole in the side of Mount Diablo you say? Giant underground lake? My my, I’ve not seen this much excitement since Mrs. Maynard decided to wear a negligee on the night of our thirtieth wedding anniversary!”

Sam and Zach glanced at each other a little uncomfortably while Dean positively beamed at the little man.

“Damn, Scooter, you’re gonna have to tell me that story sometime!”

Maynard stared at him for a second before bursting into raucous guffaws of laughter, slapping Dean enthusiastically on the back before leaning into him conspiratorially. “My boy, maybe you and I should get together and compare notes…”

Dean raised a wicked eyebrow. “I expect I could learn a thing or two, huh?”

The professor opened his mouth to make a suitable boast, but his eyes suddenly skittered to the figure approaching from the Jeep, and he was scuttling off toward him in an instant, Dean apparently already forgotten.

“Jon, my boy, come, come, there are boiling lakes afoot!”

The newcomer strode toward them out of the settling swirls of dust, a powerfully built blond man almost equal to Sam in height, broad shouldered and slim with startlingly blue eyes.

He grinned warmly as he approached them, eyes twinkling. “Winchesters!” he greeted them heartily. “Nice to see you boys again in a warmer climate!”

Dean blinked once, twice, for a second imagining the man’s handsome face shrouded by the hood of a parka, snowflakes on his eyelashes and settling into the stubble on his chin. “Holy crap!” he burst out, which was followed almost immediately by Sam’s amazed,

“Jon? Jon Volsung?”

The marine biologist nodded in confirmation, pulling Sam into a rough bear hug before slapping his back so hard Dean half expected his little brother’s teeth to shoot out of his head.

“You’re a long way from Canada, my friend!” Jon observed, shaking Sam’s hand as he pulled away slightly.

“And you’re a long way from Norway!” Sam returned. “What are you doing here?”

“Yeah,” Dean interjected. “What the hell’s a Norwegian marine biologist doing in California of all places?”

Jon turned to face him suddenly, eating up the distance between them in two long strides.

“Dean Winchester, it’s been too long!”

Dean braced himself and barely disguised a flinch as Jon pulled him into a powerful embrace before literally yanking him off his feet a couple of inches.

“Du-ude!” he managed to splutter out as the air was knocked from his lungs. “We mere mortals need oxygen, remember?”

Jon dropped him with a massive grin, his teeth startlingly white against his newly-acquired California tan as he turned back toward Sam. “Your brother’s shrunk in the sunlight, Sam,” he said. “Look how tiny he is without six layers of clothing!”

Dean glanced down at his t-shirt and jeans, an affronted grimace puckering his forehead. “Hey…!”

“If his legs weren’t so bowed he’d be as tall as us normal-sized guys,” Sam commented, positively beaming at his brother, who shot a venomous scowl in his direction.

“That ‘Hey!’ applies to you too, Gigantor—”

“Wait!” Daisy held up a hand suddenly, stepping between the big Norwegian and the even bigger Winchester. “You guys know each other?”

Dean snorted dryly. “Yeah, what are the odds?”

“Pretty damn phenomenal I’d say,” Zach put in.

“Yeah,” Sam agreed, still examining Jon thoughtfully. “Me too.”

Dean huffed. What was going on in Sam’s giant thinky brain now? “C’mon, man, you don’t think—”

“Last time we met was out in the middle of nowhere on the Canadian tundra,” Sam pointed out. “Now we randomly bump into each other in the middle of nowhere California-style, right where ‘weird stuff’ is going down?”

“Coincidence.” It sounded lame, even to Dean’s ears.

“Divine intervention?” Jon offered.

Dean looked at him. “Don’t tell me you got religion since the last time we met?”

“After what I saw in Canada,” Jon informed him wistfully, “I believe anything is possible.” He smiled playfully. “And when Winchesters are involved? Anything can happen and frequently does.”

Daisy cocked an eyebrow. “What happened in Canada?”

She was met by an awkward silence, Jon finally replying, “I’m still not sure I know.”

Daisy nodded, glancing from Sam to Dean. “More ‘weird stuff’?”

“It’s what we do,” Dean replied with a half-smile before deftly changing the subject. “So what are you doing here, Frodo?” he asked, glancing sideways at Sam. “Not that me ’n Samwise here aren’t happy to see you…”

Sam frowned at him. “You realize that makes you Gollum, right?” he suggested archly.

“Hey, let’s not be nasty!” Dean said defensively. “I’m not the one called you ‘Samwise’ in the first place!”

“Makes a helluva lot more sense than ‘Frodo’!”

“I was being ironic! He’s tall, dude!”

“Unlike yourself?”

“You call me short one more time and I’ll kick your ass all the way back to Canada, Sasquatch—”

“You and whose army, Shorty?”

“Ahem.” Jon cleared his throat pointedly, and the brothers instantly ceased their bickering, eyes downcast like a couple of naughty schoolboys.

“Jeez, you two are just like an old married couple,” Daisy observed.

“A senile old married couple,” Zach agreed.

The Winchesters glanced at each other sheepishly before Dean coughed awkwardly and repeated his earlier question. “So Volsung. What’s a nice marine biologist like you doing in a place like this?”

Jon’s amused smile faltered a little. “I’ve been working at Stanford’s Hopkins Marine Center out at Pacific Grove,” he explained. “I was brought in as a consultant a couple of months ago when the researchers there noticed the ocean’s temperature had risen a couple of degrees above what is usual for this time of year. They didn’t think much of it at first, but the temperature kept on rising over the next few days, the water for a hundred square miles gradually becoming hotter and hotter, until a day ago, when it finally became superheated.” He took a breath and swallowed. “Yesterday I stood and watched as the Pacific Ocean boiled. All the marine life in the area is dead or dying. It’s catastrophic, and whatever’s doing it, it seems to be affecting a hundred mile stretch of coast from the San Francisco Bay area down towards Monterey Bay.”

Sam scrunched his brow. “What the hell could cause something like that?” he asked.

Maynard coughed politely and the group’s attention shifted to the diminutive professor. “That was why I was consulted,” he put in, puffing out his chest a little. “I believe there might be some kind of geological explanation for this marine catastrophe.”

“Tectonic plate shift, right?” Dean hazarded, causing the group’s attention to swing back in his direction, Sam’s mouth hanging open a little. Dean shrugged dismissively. “What? That motel we stayed in when you had chicken pox got the Discovery Channel.”

“You’re quite right my boy,” Maynard confirmed. “It’s possible the North American Plate shifting against the Pacific Plate has caused volcanic activity beneath the ocean’s surface, causing the water to become superheated.”

“What about the lake we found?” Daisy put in. “The one underneath Mount Diablo?”

Maynard’s face collapsed in on itself, and it took a second for Dean to register that he was laughing.

“Oh my dear, that’s just not possible,” the professor insisted. “Mount Diablo is situated between two converging earthquake faults and is the result of subduction—the Pacific Plate sliding beneath the North American Plate, which causes the earth to buckle and push rock upwards. The earth becomes compressed, and the mountain is formed by this displaced rock being pushed outwards and up. Big caverns like the one you described on the phone would only be carved out by water erosion, and as far as I’m aware there’s no flowing water beneath this part of the Diablo range, hasn’t been for thousands of years…”

Dean held out a hand in the direction of the mountain. “Take a look if you don’t believe us, Scooter,” he said. “Unless all four of us were experiencing some kind of group hallucination, that lake’s there alright.”

“And it was boiling,” Sam added. “Just like the ocean.”

* * * *

Sam was relieved to note the lack of steam billowing from the cavern’s entrance as he and their little recon party approached.

“You think the quake caused the water to boil?” Dean asked, glancing back in Sam’s direction as he stepped into the humid darkness. “That’s why it stopped? Because the quake stopped?”

Sam shrugged. “Either that or—”

“There’s no water left to boil.”

Dean was staring down into the cavern as Sam drew level with him, and the younger brother let out an involuntary gasp at the sight which met his eyes.

“It boiled away,” he said quietly. “The whole lake boiled away!”

“How is that even possible?” Dean asked, eyes still fixed to the damp cavern floor which continued to steam forlornly.

“It’s about as possible as the lake being here in the first place,” Sam commented, as Daisy pushed past him, deftly elbowing both brothers out of her way.

“What the hell…?” she said, making to rush down to the floor of the cavern just as Dean caught her arm and held her fast.

“Quite possibly,” he commented, raising his eyebrows at Sam as he inclined his head toward the center of the cavern. Previously submerged beneath the lake and still partially obscured by hazy white steam, they could just about make out the rocky floor of the cave appearing to slope downwards into what looked like a giant funnel culminating in a bottomless black pit perhaps twenty feet in diameter. “You know if I didn’t know any better,” Dean said slowly, “I’d say that looked like—”

“A sinkhole,” Sam agreed uncomfortably. “Just like back in Leicester.”

Daisy glanced from one to the other of them. “What the hell happened in Leicester?” she demanded, a little more forcefully than Zach had earlier.

“Hell happened,” Dean told her shortly.

She blinked at him.

“Maybe the Spanish really did see the Devil here all those years ago,” Sam observed. “Dean, if this is another Hellgate—”

“Hellgate?” Daisy echoed, choking off an almost hysterical laugh. “You guys are kidding, right? Please tell me you don’t believe this is an actual Hellgate?” When both brothers continued to gaze at her levelly, not the slightest trace of humor on their faces, she blinked blankly at them. “Oookay,” she said, backing away from them slowly, hands raised in mock surrender. “Well when you boys decide you need a ride back to that mental ward you escaped from, you just give me a holler.” She shook her head in disbelief before rolling her eyes and turning away from them, striding purposefully over the still-steaming ground toward the center of what had previously been the lake.

Dean seemed to fight the urge to pull her back, biting off a snarky retort and instead glancing over at Sam, who was once again chewing his bottom lip thoughtfully.

“So do we?” the older brother asked, his voice lowered as Sam met his gaze with a frown. “Do we believe this is a Hellgate?”

Sam was about to offer an answer, but hesitated as Jon, Zach and Professor Maynard emerged into the cave behind them.

“My goodness!” they heard Maynard burst out. “This really is quite extraordinary!”

“You guys better come see this.” Daisy’s voice floated back through the cloud of steam into which she’d disappeared, and the Winchesters approached her position cautiously, the steam beginning to thin despite the heat still radiating up through their feet.

The sinkhole was clearly visible, the rock funneling down into the bottomless blackness still shiny with moisture, and if he hadn’t seen the water boiling for himself, Sam might have believed someone had pulled a giant stopper out of the hole and the lake had merely drained away.

“You were right about them being arranged in a pattern,” Daisy told him. “It’s a ring—look.”

The boys followed the direction of Daisy’s pointing finger to where the receding waters of the lake had revealed more unnaturally white bones scattered around the circumference of the basin.

“Scattered” perhaps wasn’t the right word, Sam realized, noting that even though the water had been so violently removed from the lake, the circle of bones remained unbroken, the remains spread evenly and regularly and with quite obvious purpose.

“Something happened here,” he pronounced slowly, eyes never straying from the circle of bones. “Something cataclysmic.”

“What makes you say that?” Daisy asked. “These bones? You think they were left like this to keep the locals out?”

“Or to keep something in,” Sam agreed darkly.

“Like a devil’s trap,” Dean said, seeming to catch on to his brother’s line of thinking. “You think that’s what this is?”

“What’s a devil’s trap?” Daisy interjected, the brothers continuing their conversation as if she’d not even spoken.

Sam shrugged. “I dunno, Dean,” he said slowly. “But why else would someone arrange these bones like this?” He let the question hang, and Dean took a breath.

“So why was there nothing like this at Leicester?” the older brother asked uncertainly, his brow crinkling in contemplation. “If—if someone—something—left this here—”

“Then why not do the same in Leicester?” Sam finished for him. “If this works the way I think it’s supposed to, then that would certainly have stopped the souls of the dead from escaping as soon as—” he coughed, eyes flicking to Daisy, whose gaze was bouncing between the two of them like a spectator’s at a tennis match. “—Ferinacci’s little construction crew had finished forcing their way up to the surface.”

Dean nodded thoughtfully. “And that begs another question,” he pointed out. “Who the hell put this here?”

“And why?” Sam agreed. “Why here and not Leicester? There have always been rumors that Leicester was the site of the Eighth Gateway to Hell, but here? Beyond the Creation lore Daisy mentioned, there’s nothing to indicate this as the location of a Hellgate.”

“It’s almost as if someone expected the bad guys to try and bust out this way.”

Sam turned his gaze onto Daisy, who was still staring right back at him, her expression a little nonplussed, as if she couldn’t work out whether the brothers really were nuts or—perhaps more worryingly— really were serious.

He felt oddly relieved when Zach appeared behind her, gently placing one hand on her shoulder and deftly turning her away from the Winchesters, refocusing her attention on the nearest skeleton and lowering himself down next to her as she carefully began to examine the exposed bone. He said something to her, too low for Sam to hear, his hand moving gently between her shoulder blades, and she smiled shyly, ducking her head a little.

Something clenched in Sam’s chest, his jaw tightening.

“Sam,” Dean said, breaking in on his thoughts. “If something happens here—like Leicester—with civilians here…”

“I know,” Sam agreed, not for the first time marveling at his brother’s uncanny ability to know exactly what he was thinking. Sometimes he wondered who the psychic was supposed to be here. “We need to get them away from this place.”

That was not going to be an easy task, considering professor Maynard had already scuttled excitedly to the brink of the sinkhole while Jon was busy collecting samples from the shallow puddles of water still lurking between the cracks and crevices of the uneven floor.

“This is quite incredible,” Maynard proclaimed, peering into the darkness before squatting down and beginning to scratch at the rock with a pocket knife he seemed to have produced from thin air. He held the knife up to his nose, beckoning the boys toward him as he gingerly sniffed at the blade. “Sulfur,” he announced, eliciting an uncomfortable look to pass between the two of them. “Look, it’s everywhere.” He gestured around him with the knife, indicating the floor and the walls of the cave which, now that their eyes had adjusted to the murky light, they could clearly see appeared to be coated with a distinctive yellow substance.

Maynard shook his head a little, running a finger along the rock at his feet where the coating of sulfur seemed most concentrated. “I really wouldn’t expect to see sulfur in a non-volcanic region such as this,” he said. “Not at these levels of concentration anyway.” He stood back up, stretching slightly as he nodded at the cave walls. “Potassium nitrate,” he said. “Saltpeter. Now that’s something I’d expect to find crystallizing on the walls of a cave such as this one. But sulfur? That’s—” he paused, searching for the right word, “—unusual.”

“Not in our line of work,” Dean muttered, Sam suddenly catching him by the arm and pulling him sharply out of the professor’s earshot.

The older Winchester seemed about to protest Sam’s manhandling, but was abruptly silenced by Sam’s urgently whispered, “Sulfur, Dean! What if this is another Hellgate?”

Dean just looked at him, shifting from foot to foot uncomfortably as the lines deepened between his eyebrows. “Sam—”

“I mean, what if Lucifer’s trying to build another Hellgate? To replace the one we destroyed in Leicester?”

Dean blinked dumbly at him for a second. “Is that even possible?” he asked at length. “I mean, can he just build another exit outta the Pit whenever he feels like it?”

“I don’t know, man. But that earthquake—it didn’t exactly feel natural, did it?”

“So that makes it supernatural?”

“C’mon, you gotta admit, that thumping noise sounded way too much like construction work to just be the manifestation of Daisy’s bad temper.”

“And I guess if Lucifer’s got his minions trying to blast a hole through the earth’s crust, that could maybe account for the ocean—and the lake—boiling away,” Dean agreed reluctantly. “Whatever they’re using to force their way out of Hell, it’s gonna be generating a helluva lot of heat.” He rubbed his hand over his chin as he surveyed the cave around them thoughtfully. “So maybe our little archeologist isn’t quite the earthquake magnet with think she is.”

Sam’s focus drifted to Daisy, who was still intent on the remains scattered around her. “Maybe…” he said slowly. “But I wouldn’t rule it out just yet.”

A wicked grin inched its way across Dean’s face. “One way to find out,” he said brightly. “Next time there’s a tremor, see if you can make the earth move for her!”

Sam just looked at him, attempting to dismiss his brother’s less-than-subtle innuendo with a well-placed eye roll. “Dean, that’s so not funny,” he snapped, even as his cheeks colored. “You know it doesn’t just—I can’t just— turn it on like that—”

“Sam, I refuse to believe any brother of mine can’t just turn a girl on at the drop of a hat.”

Dean continued to grin at him infuriatingly, and Sam merely huffed. “Dean, we could be looking at a demonic invasion here,” he snapped. “Focus for a second!”

“I am focused!” Dean protested innocently. “You’re the one with your mind in the gutter! I just meant, y’know, use a little of the Force, Luke! Give her a taste of her own medicine!”

“Dean. Hellgate. Demons. Lucifer.”

Dean shrugged dismissively. “Look, there’s nothing coming out of this hole, right?” he pointed out. “Except for, y’know, a little fire and brimstone. There’s no recently-departed spooks hijacking unsuspecting passersby. And no demons. And there’s sure as hell no Lucifer—”

“But if the bones are acting as a devil’s trap—”

“We’d still be able to see the demons trying to get out of the Gate. They just wouldn’t be able to get past the circle.”

“Always supposing the bones are supposed to work like a devil’s trap.” Sam sighed, raking his fingers through his hair. “Hell, they might not even be angel bones.”

Dean shook his head, casting his gaze around the grizzly circle of remains. “But if they are?” he said, pausing before asking his next question. “Sam, what the hell could kill an angel?”

“Another angel,” Sam replied shortly. “Or at least, maybe a fallen one.”

“Demons?”

Sam shrugged. “Maybe this is some kind of battle site. Maybe these are the earthly remains of the angels who died. Daisy did say some cultures used to leave the remains of the fallen on show as a warning…”

“A warning against what?”

“Rebellion. Disobedience. Dean, if this was the site of a battle between angels—between rebellious angels—and—and those loyal to—”

“God?” Dean shook his head. “Sam, come on. I’m not even sure I buy into the whole ‘angel’ deal, but God? Seriously?”

“Look, just think about it,” Sam insisted. “The bones, the cave… This could be it, man! The place where they fell!”

“Sam—”

“Lucifer and his followers. This could be the place where they were cast out—where they were thrown into the Pit after they rose up against Heaven—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second there, Sparky!” Dean held up his hands. “You’re talking about the Fall? Lucifer’s actual Fall from Heaven? Like in the Bible stories?”

“Dean, we’ve met Lucifer! We know it’s not just a story!”

“So—what? You think God left these bones here to discourage another uprising?”

Sam shrugged. “Maybe. According to the legends, many of Heaven’s army were lost during that battle. And it would also account for why this site is so closely guarded. Why there’s a devil’s trap of angelic remains surrounding it. Why we’ve not heard about it before.”

“Sam, I’m still not sure—”

“Look,” Sam continued excitedly. “Dean, think about it! Maybe this isn’t a Hellgate at all! Maybe this gateway was only ever intended to be used once. And then only for a one way trip…”

Dean raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Fallen angels check in, demons don’t check out?” He paused for a second to consider that. “And you think maybe they’re trying to turn a dead end into a revolving door?”

Sam merely shrugged. “We’ve heard of crazier things.”

Dean thought about that for a second. “But still—angels? C’mon, man. There’s no such thing.”

“Dean, Lucifer was an angel! You’re telling me you don’t believe in him now?”

Dean opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before finally shaking his head in disbelief. “Sam, you can’t be serious about this!” he managed at length. “The Fall? It’s just a story—a myth—”

“Like wendigo?” Sam suggested. “Or werewolves. How about chupacabra? Kikituk? Spring Heeled Jacks? Radiant boys? Ghosts? Demons?”

“Okay, okay!” Dean held up his hands. “I get the picture!” He shook his head before muttering, “Geekboy know-it-all,” under his breath. “But come on, Sam. Angels?”

“Someone left these bones here like this, Dean.”

“Doesn’t mean it was friggin’ angels!”

“Doesn’t mean it wasn’t. If there’s demons—and we know there’s demons—then it stands to reason there have to be angels too.” Sam scratched at his nose thoughtfully, eyes straying back to the circle of unearthly remains before lighting up suddenly. “You know what? Maybe demons are repulsed by the remains themselves,” he hazarded. “Maybe it’s not the pattern they’re laid out in that matters so much. Maybe it’s just their presence here that keeps the demons—” He paused for a second. “Down There. Maybe this was a way for those who fell in battle to continue protecting their brethren. To continue protecting Heaven.” He glanced around himself. “And Earth.”

A tiny line of concentration crinkled between Dean’s eyebrows. “Decomposing angel corpses would pretty much make this whole place a no-go area for those of a demonic persuasion,” he added thoughtfully. “If the remains work the way you think they do. Maybe there’s more to this than just the bones.”

Sam considered that. “Organic material seeping into the ground and making the whole area toxic to demons?” He cocked an eyebrow at his brother, impressed by Dean’s line of thinking. “That’d be pretty ingenious. And could explain why these earthquakes—and their side effects—are a hell of a lot more severe than what was going on in Leicester.”

Dean nodded. “Maybe they have to bring the whole damn mountain down in order to destroy the circle of protection.”

Sam continued to nod thoughtfully. “Could be the fault line,” he offered. “Maybe that’s why they’re blasting away at it—in the hopes of destabilizing enough of the area to completely eradicate any trace of the remains. Neutralize the protection they offer. Create a new Gateway to Earth…”

Dean looked like a light bulb suddenly went off behind his eyes. “The lake! Sam, the lake—if these remains really did once belong to angels and the remains seeped into the earth and into the lake, then the water could have been—”

“Holy water,” Sam finished for him.

“No wonder they needed to boil it away.”

“And the ocean boiling—that was just a byproduct of their destabilizing the fault line—they only needed to get rid of the water here, but the heat they’re generating superheated a couple hundred miles of fault line into the bargain.”

“Talk about demonic overkill,” Dean commented, shaking his head. “Okay, so if that’s what’s going on here…” He trailed off, pausing briefly before continuing, “Then how the hell do we stop it?”

Sam took a breath, folding his arms over his chest before chewing nervously on a thumbnail. “I don’t know if we can…”

“Yeah, demonic uprising? Kind of a bit above our pay grade,” Dean agreed. “But it’s not like we haven’t plugged up a Hellgate before.” His attention wandered to Daisy, who had just passed between the two of them, intent on a skull sticking up out of the ground a couple of feet behind him. She was humming softly to herself, even as she brushed gingerly at the ancient remains. “Well at least someone’s happy in their work,” Dean commented. “Y’know, considering we could be on the brink of a Demonic Apocalypse and everything.”

Daisy laughed, not even looking up at him. “Yeah, Demonic Apocalypse, sure,” she said, nodding sagely. “Whatever you say, guys.”

“We’re not kidding,” Sam insisted, taking a step towards her.

“And we’re not nuts,” Dean added preemptively.

Daisy did look up at that. “But you really do fight demons and monsters, right?”

Dean glanced awkwardly at Sam, as if not entirely sure how to answer that question, and Daisy merely inclined her head in Zach’s direction.

“He tells me there’s a little bit more to you two than just the poor man’s Ghost Busters.”

“Not so much of the ‘poor man,’ Indy,” Dean admonished her, turning back toward where Jon was collecting water samples from the couple of puddles that were all that was left of what would appear to have been an entire lake full of holy water.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Daisy responded completely insincerely. “Didn’t mean to wound your pride there, Ray.”

Dean made a face at her. “Hey, if I wanted to be insulted I could go talk to Frodo,” he informed her. “In fact, I might just do that!”

“Knock yourself out, sweetheart,” Daisy returned. “Boring conversation anyway.”

“You’re no Han Solo either, baby!” Dean returned, and Sam was fairly sure he could hear his brother’s teeth grinding together as he stomped off in Jon’s direction, stopping so suddenly he almost skidded on the damp rock as Daisy resumed her humming.

Whirling back around, he was looming over the young archaeologist before she’d even finished the first line of whatever it was she was singing.

“What is that?” Dean demanded, glaring down at her.

She looked up at him, frowning. “It’s a skull,” she told him, indicating the remains she was busy uncovering. “Alas, poor Yorick, y’know?” When Dean didn’t respond to that, she added, “What does it look like, pumpkin pie?”

Dean rolled his eyes. “If only,” he breathed, obviously struggling to maintain his patience with the girl. “The song. The song you were singing.”

It was Daisy’s turn to shrug. “Helps calm me down,” she informed him dismissively. “You know, when people are doing their best to irritate the crap out of me?”

“It’s a nursery rhyme,” Dean informed her.

She blinked up at him a couple of times. “Yeah? So sue me! I happen to like it. It has sentimental value. My mom used to sing me to sleep with it.”

Dean swallowed, his eyes meeting Sam’s meaningfully. “Yeah, mine too.”

For a second, Sam was at a complete loss as to why Daisy humming a nursery rhyme to herself should be completely freaking his big brother out. It wasn’t like it was any weirder than Dean singing Metallica to himself when he got stressed, right?

“Sam,” Dean prompted. “Alyssa. When she wiped my memory back in Phoenix. Dude, it’s the same song!”

Sam blinked a couple of times. “The nursery rhyme?” He cast his mind back, shuddering slightly as he remembered that blank, scared look in his brother’s eyes after Alyssa Medina had whammied Dean’s memory right out of him.

Daisy got to her feet abruptly. “Hold on there, hotstuff!” she interrupted. “My mom told me that nursery rhyme’s an old family tune—been passed down from generation to generation for, like, ever. So I’m sorry, but there’s no way your mommy used to sing it to you when you were a rugrat.”

Dean raised an eyebrow. “Wanna bet?”

Daisy squared her shoulders. “Actually, yes,” she informed him. “Seeing as it’s a song about some cowboy who was, like, my great-great-great-great-something-or-other-grandpa.”

Dean’s mouth fell open slightly, but all that seemed to come out of it was air.

“Emmanuel Claviger?” Sam jumped in, barely able to believe what he was hearing. “Daisy, you’re related to Emmanuel Claviger?”

“Holy crap,” Dean muttered, swaying on his feet a little, as if this was maybe just one coincidence too many for one day. And Sam couldn’t say he blamed him.

“Claviger…” Daisy rolled the name around on her tongue, clearly oblivious to Dean’s horror or Sam’s disbelief. “Claviger…. Yeah, that sounds familiar,” she said finally. “Not sure about Emmanuel, though. Think I’d have remembered being related to someone called Emmanuel. I think the name my mom mentioned was James…”

“Claviger?” Sam clarified. “James Claviger was your great-great-great—”

“Whatever.”

“—grandfather?”

Daisy nodded. “Yeah, that sounds about right. My mom’s family.”

Sam glanced up at Dean, who had paled considerably. “Emmanuel Claviger’s younger son,” he explained, his mind’s eye trying to conjure up the details of the complicated family tree he remembered drawing up on a napkin in some diner back in Phoenix. “The doctor. Shadrack Mann’s grandfather.”

Dean raised an eyebrow. “Little Miss Earthquake’s related to the old kook that gave me this?” He fingered the amulet about his neck a little disconcertedly.

Daisy was back to glancing from one to the other of them in turn. “Wait, wait, wait!” she insisted. “How do you know all this stuff about my family? I mean—I never met the guy, but I know there was some swamp-dweller nutjob called Shadrack who my family never talked about—” She paused for a second, glancing at Dean’s amulet with the detached curiosity of an archaeologist. “You knew him?”

Dean inclined his head slightly. “Kinda.”

“We’re—uh—” Sam stammered. “Sorta related to him too. Your great-great-great-grandfather James Claviger? He was the younger brother of our great-great-great-grandfather, John Claviger. The cowboy in the nursery rhyme—Emmanuel—he was their father.”

“Charm ’round his neck…” Daisy murmured, still examining Dean’s amulet. Gingerly, she reached out to run her finger over the charm, pulling back in surprise as something that was probably just static crackled at her touch.

Yeah, totally just static, Sam completely failed to convince himself.

Dean squinted down at the girl appraisingly. “You know what this means, right?” he said, a grin slowly teasing its way across his face.

Daisy looked up at him, her frown pretty damn threatening. “You ever call me ‘Cousin Daisy’ you’ll be wearing your kneecaps as a hat, Bo,” she informed him archly, tugging at the amulet meaningfully and yelping as another crackle of electricity bit at her fingers. “Dammit, what is that thing?”

“Your mom ever tell you much else about Shadrack Mann?” Dean asked.

Daisy shook her head. “I told you—he was the family whack job.”

“Well, you got that part right…”

“He gave you this?”

“Family heirloom.”

“The charm from the nursery rhyme?”

“You catch on quick.”

“What does it do?”

Dean glanced over at Sam. “It’s kind of a protection thing.”

Daisy raised an eyebrow. “Can I have it?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“’Cause you’re a girl.”

When Daisy looked like she might punch Dean’s lights out, Sam stepped smoothly between them. “It’s complicated,” he informed her. “Long story—”

“I take it off I die,” Dean added helpfully.

Daisy did a double take. “Hey, if you don’t want me to have it, just say. I’m not stupid y’know—”

“It’s the truth,” Sam interceded on Dean’s behalf. “He really will die if he takes it off.”

Daisy squinted at him. “Seriously?” At Sam’s nod, she blew out a breath. “What the hell was crazy Cousin Shadrack into?”

“That’s complicated too,” Dean informed her.

“Too complicated for a girl to understand?” Daisy was grinning sardonically, but Sam could tell from the confused look on Dean’s face that his brother wasn’t at all sure whether she was being serious or not.

“I never said—”

Dean never got to finish his sentence, a distant rumble turning into a judder beneath their feet.

“Aw, c’mon, Indy! Gimme a break! I was only kidding!”

Daisy scowled at him. “I told you, these earthquakes aren’t my fault!”

As the rumbling increased in volume, the ground began to shake a little harder.

“Uh—Sam?”

Sam glanced at his brother. “This feel different to you?” he asked over the growing cacophony.

“Not so much a quake as a—vibration,” Dean agreed, nodding.

He caught hold of Daisy’s arm as the ground lurched beneath their feet, and for once she didn’t protest as he began to draw her away from the hole in the center of the cave.

“Jon! Professor!” Sam called over to the two scientists still examining the rim of the sinkhole. “I think you’d better get away from there—”

The words had barely left his lips when a column of flame shot up out of the hole, Professor Maynard stumbling backwards as Jon caught him and attempted to drag him away to safety.

“What the hell…?”

Sam followed Zach’s gaze upwards, where the pillar of fire was rapidly blackening the cave roof, orange fingers scrabbling across the rock like vaults in a cathedral.

Or flames on a nursery ceiling.

Dean didn’t say anything, but he didn’t move either.

“Dean?” Sam yelled over the deafening rumble. “Dean!”

Daisy had taken it upon herself to start tugging at Dean’s amulet again, the resulting buzz of electricity finally succeeding in tearing his attention away from the dancing flames above his head and returning him to the present.

“I think we need to get out of here,” he said a little groggily, his voice oddly strained.

Sam nodded his agreement, gagging as the noxious stench of sulfur began to assault his nostrils. “Like, yesterday,” he agreed. “Jon! We need to go…!”

The unmistakable sound of screaming began to emanate from the sinkhole, tendrils of anguished sound reaching up from the depths of the earth to mingle with the flame and the rumble of quivering rock, and Sam was vividly reminded of Leicester, of the souls of the dead seeking release from their eternal torment.

“Jon! Now!”

Volsung grabbed hold of the flustered professor, dragging him back toward the Winchesters, both of them stumbling as the ground seemed to lurch violently, a loud crack rending the air above them as the rock began to crumble and disintegrate below.

Zach ran to their aid, catching hold of the professor as Jon regained his footing, the ground tilting back toward the sinkhole as rock and debris tore itself free and bounced back down the slope, disappearing into the entrance to the bottomless pit.

“Sam—!”

Sam nodded as Dean made to pull Daisy toward the cave’s entrance. “Go! I’ll help them!” he assured his brother, but instead fell to his knees as a crack formed right under him.

“Sam!”

Still keeping a tight hold on Daisy, Dean reached out for his brother as a strong wind shot up out of the sinkhole, hot and violent as it began to whip and whirl around them, the screams of the damned borne up out of the Pit to reverberate off the cavern walls, even as the whole mountain seemed to be shaking itself to pieces.

Sam covered his ears with both hands, squeezing his eyes shut as Dean and Daisy were thrown to the ground beside him. But it wasn’t enough to block out the overpowering noise or the heat or the smell, and he almost felt as if he was being dragged down to Hell itself as the terrible screams reverberated all around him and the noisome whirlwind ripped at his clothes and his hair.

“Sam!”

Sam risked opening his eyes at the insistent tug on his sleeve, Dean pointing toward the opening to the sinkhole as dark shadows began to emerge from within the blackness, resolving into vaguely humanoid shapes guttering within the jets of flame still reaching up to the ceiling.

“We really need to get out of here…” Dean stated the obvious, attempting to pull both Sam and Daisy to their feet but failing spectacularly, the young archaeologist seemingly rooted to the spot as her eyes widened in terror.

“What…?” Unable to form a coherent sentence, she pointed instead to the edge of the bone circle, where the darkness itself seemed to be moving, silhouettes and the shadowy suggestion of something crawling up out of the sinkhole and slithering toward the remains.

“Sam, I really hope you’re right about this…” Dean muttered, both Winchesters holding their breaths as the dark shapes approached the bones…but ventured no further.

It was as if an invisible wall had been thrown up around the sinkhole, rocks still bouncing and juddering back down into the opening, but the emerging shadows unable to pass any further than the ring of remains.

“Devil’s trap,” Sam breathed in relief. “Told you!”

“All right, Mr. Smartypants,” Dean said. “You figured that out, can you figure out a way to stop the ground shaking long enough to let us out of here?”

“I don’t—”

The rest of Sam’s sentence was abruptly cut off as an eerie white light suddenly began to cast even more shadows onto the walls all around them.

At first unable to pinpoint the source of the light, Sam blinked hard in the direction of the sinkhole, where the very absence of light seemed to be collapsing in on itself as a blinding whiteness filled every inch of the cave.

Growing brighter and brighter as the darkness seemed to swirl back down into the sinkhole, Sam screwed up his eyes against the light which seemed to be emanating from the bones themselves, pulsing and vibrating in concert with the ground upon which they had lain undisturbed for thousands of years.

“Sam!”

Sam felt Dean’s hand on the back of his neck, pushing him and Daisy both down against the ground as a terrible scream like a million souls giving voice to their unending torment shredded the air above their heads and the light became so blinding all Sam could see was white, even with his eyes screwed tightly shut.

Then there was a sound like the absence of sound, the opposite of sound, the light growing even brighter until a deathly silence seemed to suck the air right out of the cave and a bright white flash dissolved the world around them….

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The Winchester Chronicles