"Demonic omens, like a friggin' tidal wave," Bobby says, staring down at the variet of material littering his desk. "Cattle deaths, lightning storms. They skyrocketed from out of nowhere, all around here—" he unfolds a map and points to Wyoming, "—except for one place. Southern Wyoming."

"Wyoming?" Dean asks with furrowed brows.

"That one area's totally clean—spotless. It's almost as if the demons are surrounding it."

"But you don't know why?"

"No," Bobby scoffs. "And by this point, my eyes are swimming. Sam, would you take a look at it? Maybe you can catch something my eyes couldn't."

Dean glowers at Bobby.

If there's one thing he's thankful for, it's that Bobby nailed Wyoming down. The crossroads demon told him as much. Now, hopefully Dean wouldn't have to come out and say exactly where Katherine is. Wouldn't have to explain how he came across this knowledge. Wouldn't have to suffer the berratement of not only Sam and Bobby, but Katherine too, once they got to her.

"Sure," Sam hums, nodding.

"C'mon, Dean," Bobby says, waving Dean across the room. "I got more books in the trunk. Help me lug 'em in?"

Hesitantly, Dean follows after the old hunter. Once outside, he turns into a Bobby Singer Dean hadn't yet met.

"You stupid ass," Bobby snarls, turning on Dean. "What did you do?" Dean glances away from him, and Bobby grips Dean's collar. "What did you do?! You made a deal for Sam, didn't you?"

"And Katherine," Dean says.

Bobby's face is still overtaken with fury, and Dean can't bring himself to be angry with him. Why should he? "How long'd they give you?"

"Bobby..."

"How long?!"

It's a roar that echoes across the junkyard. Dean's never seen Bobby so hurt. Furious. His eyes are glassy with tears, angry or sad, he doesn't know. Perhaps both. And Dean finds it so hard to look him in the eye as he answers, "One year."

"Dammit, Dean!" Bobby cries.

"Which is why we've got to find this Yellow-eyed son of a bitch," Dean continues. "I'm gonna kill him myself...I ain't got nothin' to lose now, espeically since he's possessing Katherine, and the demon I talked to told me where she is."

"I hope we do find her," Bobby snarls. "I hope we do, so she'd kick your ass twice as bad as I ever would!" Bobby starts pacing. "What is it with you Winchesters, huh?" He growls. "You, your daddy, you're just itchin' to throw yourselves in the pit!"

"That's my point," Dean says, the opposite of calm but in the most minute sense. Tears are rising in his throat. "Dad brought me back, Bobby. I'm not even supposed to be here. At least this way, something good can come out of it, huh? It's like my life can mean somethin'."

"And it didn't before?!" Bobby cries. He stares at Dean for a long moment. Hollow. "Have you got that low of an opinion of yourself?! Are you that screwed in the head?!" He takes a hold of Dean's jacket collar again. "Oh, I ought to let Katherine Donovan get a hold of 'ya!"

"I couldn't let him die, Bobby," Dean whispers, shaking his head, even unable to help the crack in his voice. "He's my brother. And I...I couldn't let that demon keep Katherine. No way."

"How is your brother gonna feel when he knows you're going to Hell?" Bobby asks. "And that girl? How did you feel when you knew your Dad went for you?"

"You can't tell 'em," Dean orders. "You take a shot at me, whatever you want to do, but you can't tell them. Please."

And it takes everything in Bobby Singer to keep from imagining a life without Dean. His boy. 

There's got to be something. Somewhere, someone—

Something rattles the fence on the far side of the yard. The two hunters slink into a crouch and move to the nearest trashed car for cover. Dean stares into the shattered glass windshield of the car just in front of them, waiting. Then a shadow darkens the glass, and they pounce.

What—

"Ellen?" She's holding her chin high, staring at the two with panic-stricken eyes. Quickly, the woman nods. "Ellen!" Dean crushes her to his chest.Thank God.

"Come on—come on, let's get you inside."

Bobby gives Dean a look. She's got to be tested.

So once they're in his home, he slides a shot of holy water across the table. 

"Is this really necessary?" Ellen Harvelle asks, staring Bobby down with an exasperated expression.

"Just a belt of Holy Water," Bobby says with a shrug. "Couldn't hurt." Ellen picks up the glass of water and downs it.

"Refreshing," she chirps. "Whiskey, now, if you don't mind."

"Ellen, what happened?" Dean demands, willing the emotion in his voice to just...cease. "How'd you get out?" Perched on the desk beside him, Sam anxiously shifts. 

"I wasn't supposed to," Ellen replies. "I was supposed to be in there with everybody else, but we ran out of pretzels, of all things." Bobby slides the woman a shot of whiskey. "It was just dumb luck." She downs the liquor in one go. "That's when Ash called. He was...scared to Hell. Told me to look in the safe. That's when the call cut out. By the time I got back, the flames were sky-high and everybody was dead. I couldn't have been more than fifteen minutes. A lot of good people died in there."

Not for the first time, Ellen notices a missing key player. She turns her hard hazel gaze to Dean. "Where's Katherine Louise?"

Dean glances down to his hands. "That yellow-eyed demon we talked about a while ago," he says. "It's possessing her."

"Oh," Ellen whispers, and she begins to tremble. "Oh, that girl—" She shakes her head.

"You mentioned a safe," Dean says, effectively changing the subject...for now.

"A safe we keep hidden in the basement."

"Did the demons get to what was in it?"

"No," Ellen says, shaking her head. She reaches into her jacket pocket and lays out a folded-up map.

"Wyoming?" Dean asks. The territory is marked with a series of 'x's. "What's that mean?"

Everyone gets to digging. Hours pass. Lots of whiskey.

"I got somethin'," Bobby hollers, and everyone joins him in the cluttered dining room. "Each of the 'x's on the map is an abandoned frontier church, all mid-19th century, all built by Samuel Colt."

"Samuel Colt," Dean repeats. "The demon-killing, gun-making Samuel Colt?"

"Yep. There's more. He built private railway lines connecting the churches. It just happened to lay out like this." A pentagram connects the x's.

"Tell me that's not what I think it is."

"A devil's trap," Sam murmurs.

"A one hundred square mile devil's trap," Bobby elaborates.

"That's brilliant," Dean laughs. "Iron lines demons can't cross."

"I've never heard of anything that massive," Ellen scoffs.

"You think Katherine knew about this?" Sam asks.

Dean tenses. Knew. "That girl knows more than she shares, I'll bet." He shifts a bit. "After all these years, none of the lines have broken? It still works?"

"Definitely," Sam says.

Dean eyes him. "How do you know?"

"All those omens Bobby found," Sam says with a shrug. "The demons must be circling and can't get in."

"Yeah, well," Bobby scoffs. "They're tryin'."

"Why?" Ellen asks. "What's inside?"

"Well, I found something about an old cowboy cemetery that would be..." Dean glances to the map. "Right in the middle."

"Well what's so important about a cemetery?" Sam asks. "Or what's Colt trying to protect?"

"What if Colt wasn't trying to keep the demons out?" Dean wonders after a moment. "What if he was trying to keep something in?"

"That's a comforting thought," Ellen scoffs.

"Could they get inside, Bobby?" Sam asks, looking up to the older man.

"This thing's so powerful, you'd practically need an A-Bomb to destroy it," Bobby muses. "No way a full-blood demon could get across." The man shakes his head.

Sam stares at the map and chews his lip. Full-blood. "No," he murmurs. "No, but I know who could." His eyes flit to Dean's, whose own narrow. "Jake Talley."

"Yeah, fuck that guy," Deann mutters.

"The kid who got you?" Bobby asks Sam, and to which the young hunter nods. 

"If he can get across with Jake, then why does he have Katherine?" Dean demands. 

That's a question no one has answer for. But Sam...Sam might have some explaining to do. A revelation to make.

Lord give him strength.

✕

"Aloha, Jake."

The soldier turns around to find the blonde sitting on the hood of his old car. Her hair is pulled back into a thick ponytail, pulled over one shoulder in a long, uniform length. She's still in the same clothes as before. She's smirking. "Have a nice trip?"

"I'm here," he says. "I did what you asked. Now what?"

"Fifty miles that-a-way," she begins, pointing straight ahead. "There's a cemetery. In that cemetery is a crypt. You're going to open it for me."

"Screw you and your freaky orders," Jake scoffs. "Go do it yourself!"

"Oh, I can't," she tsks. "I can't go that way yet."

"Why not?"

She grins. "Any more questions and mommy dearest is going to watch as her little girl chokes on her own blood. So." She drums her hands on her thighs. "If you're gonna open that crypt, you'll be needing the key, I suspect." She reaches into her jacket pocket and holds a pistol out to the soldier, her finger pressing down on the trigger as she balances it on her index finger. It's not loaded, of course.

"A gun?"

Yellow Eyes lets out a sigh. "Would you just take it?" He does. "It's not just any gun, Jake Talley," she says, reaching into her jacket pocket and pulls a single bullet out. "This is the only gun in the universe than can kill me dead."

"Is that so?"

"Yep. Here." She drops the bullet into his hand. Jake loads it, pulls the hammer, and aims the barrel at Katherine's head. The demon sighs and raises her hands. "Oh, my," she dryly states. "I'm shocked at this unforeseen turn of events." She rolls her eyes and looks at Jake. "Go ahead, soldier. Squeeze that trigger." She presses the barrel of that gun straight to her forehead. "Your life can go back to normal. But then, would the Army take you back? Are you AWOL, or...yeah, you're AWOL. Deserter?" She laughs. "And if you're not court-martialled, maybe you can get your job at the factory back. Of course, if you do this, then your and your family's life could be money and honey, health and wealth...no intestine-chewing or blood-choking whatsoever. On my behalf, anyway. Hemophilia is rampant these days, isn't it? Anyway, all you gotta do is one little thing. C'mon, it's more than a fair deal. Clearly."

The young man bites down on his tongue before asking, "Why me?"

"Oh, Jake," she sighs, tilting her head towards the Heavens. "I thought we would be past the inane questions by now. Sam Winchester wouldn't have asked me so many questions. But, here you are, my Champion. I've waited a long time for you. You're my leader. Open that crypt, I will give you your army."

"You're talking about the end of the world!"

"The end?" She laughs. "No, not the end. The beginning! A better world, where your family will be protected. Oh, more than that! They'll be royalty. But, you know, your call." She shrugs and places her hands on her hips, shifts her weight. Jake presses the hammer forward and lowers the gun. Yellow Eyes grins. "Attababy."

Katherine said it often when she was younger. She'd say it to her sister when she first started talking.

She's madder than Hell, hearing the demon say her phrase. It was special to her and her family. How dare he speak it?

By the time Jake Talley reaches the middle of the cemetery, where the crypt is, it's nightfall. The Winchesters are already there, hiding, waiting. Dean's endgame is finding Katherine. His heart pumps metric tons of adrenaline through his body, just waiting for her. One step at a time, Winchester.

"Howdy, Jake," Sam calls. The soldier turns around. Sam, Bobby, Ellen, and Dean all step forward, all with guns in their hands, pointed in his direction.

"You were dead," Jake says. "I killed you."

"Yeah?" Sam asks. "Well next time, finish the job."

"I did! I cut clean through your spinal cord, man. You can't be alive. You can't be."

"Just take it reeeal easy there, son," Bobby says.

"And if I don't?"

"Wait and see," Sam goads.

Jake squares his shoulders. "What, you're a tough guy all of a sudden? What are you gonna do? Kill me?"

"It's a thought."

"You had your chance," Jake scoffs. "You couldn't."

"I won't make that mistake twice."

Jake laughs.

"What are you smiling at, you little bitch?" Dean asks.

"Hey, lady?" Jake asks, shifting his gaze to Ellen. "Do me a favor. Put that gun to your head." 

Everyone watches as Ellen, fighting as hard as she can, draw the muzzle of her pistol up to her head.

"See, that Ava girl was right," Jake says." Once you give in to it, there's all sorts of Jedi mind tricks you can learn."

"Let her go," Sam demands.

"Shoot him," Ellen says through her teeth.

"You'd be mopping up skull before you get a shot off," Jake warns. "Everybody put your guns down. Except you, sweetheart." They all do. No mind tricks. No Force. Jake swiftly turns around, jamming the muzzle of the Colt into the slot in the crypt door. Dean and Bobby lunge for Ellen, pulling and pushing at her hand before she can shoot herself in the head.

Sam shoots Jake once, twice, three times in the back in the area of his heart. Three times in the head.

Dean forces himself to believe that Jake Talley wasn't the only way to Katherine.

The dial the Colt is lodged in spins until the two wheels line up to be an ornate pentagram. A devil's trap. Something that sounds like locks unbolting echoes up the chamber.

"Oh, no," Bobby groans.

"Bobby, what is it?" Ellen asks.

"It's Hell." Dean pulls the Colt from the door just as it begins to rattle. "Take cover, now!"

The hunters scatter, sprinting off in different directions, diving behind headstones and monuments. Then, something like an explosion rocks the ground they're on, and a thick cloud of black spreads through the cemetery in no time at all.

"What the hell just happened?!" Dean shouts over the howling wind.

"That's a devil's gate!" Ellen hollers. "A damn door to Hell!"

Dean can't help but gawk. "Who would make a door to Hell?!"

"We've got to shut the gate!"

Like Katherine might;ve been, she's the first one out from behind the headstone and into the metaphorical fire.

Dean rises to his feet, staring down at the gun that sings in his palm. Over the wind, he hears—and feels—something behind him.

He whirls, the Colt pointed directly at Katherine's forehead. It's like seeing a ghost.

She grins wickedly, beautiful blue eyes now an awful yellow-green. She seems thinner. Katherine raises her hand, and the gun is sucked towards her, landing in her palm. "A boy shouldn't play with daddys' guns," she chides. She sends him across the cemetery with a flick of her hand, and he splits his forehead open on a tombstone.

"Dean!" Sam cries, and lifts himself from the door. He sprints towards Dean, leaving Bobby and Ellen to close the gate themselves. Katherine lifts her hand and throws Sam back into a neighboring tree.

"I'll get to you in a minute, champ," she giggles. "I'm proud of you! Knew you had it in you!" She turns back towards Dean, then sighs, pressing him up against the bloody headstone with that invisible force. "Sit a moment, please." She starts forward in her usual playful way. A prowl. Thens he crouches over his legs with a small smile. "So. Dean. I've gotta thank you. You see, demons can't resurrect people unless a deal is made. I know, red tape—it'll make you nuts." She shakes her head. "But thanks to you, Sammy's back in rotation! Now I wasn't counting on that, but I'm sure glad. I always liked him the best. Maybe Katherine'll be elated when she hears her beloved friend isn't dead after all. She's been all out of sorts, you see."

Dean bares his teeth. "What have you done with her, you bastard?"

"Oh, she's fine. Now, tell me." Her brow wrinkles a bit. "Have you heard the phrase, 'If a deal's too good to be true, it probably is'?"

"You call that deal good?" Dean snarls.

"Well, it's a better shake than your daddy ever got," she purrs. "And you never wondered why? I'm surprised at you," she hums, leaning forward. "I mean...you saw what your brother just did to Jake, right? Pretty cold, huh?" She chuckles, slowly leaning for him. "How certain are you that what you brought back is one hundred percent, pure Sam?" Yellow Eyes laughs, but it's Katherine's. "You of all people know what is dead should stay dead," she whispers in his ear. "Anyway!" She claps her hands once and rolls to her feet. "Thank you bunches. I knew I kept you alive for some reason," Yellow Eyes finishes in a hum. "Until now, anyway. I couldn't have done it without your pathetic, self-loathing, self-destructive desire to sacrifice yourself for your family." The demon pulls the hammer back on the gun and aims it at Dean's head.

Then the yellow eyes disappear. They're dark as night, but still a familiar, comforting blue. And he just knows—

"Katherine—!"

A spirit tackles Katherine to the ground, pinning her by the shoulders, and she's staring at the face of John Winchester.

The last she saw him was just over a year ago.

Katherine wrestles him to the ground and throws the gun to Dean. "Dean!" She shouts. John gets his arms between hers, pushing her shoulder blades together. "Dean, you've got to do it!"

"Are you crazy?!"

"Just do it, Dean! It's the only way to end it! I can't fight him any more, all right?!" She's crying. Tears well in her dark eyes and spill over her pallid cheeks. "Dean."

Behind her, John Winchester nods once.

And then those yellow eyes return, and her whole body stiffens. She throws John off of her and lunges for Dean, but he's already pulled the trigger. He's never felt such remorse or dread.

It's different than what he felt when he realized Sam was dead. There was a bit of hope as he ran towards his brother. That he couldn't really die from that knife.

But this shot would be fatal. It's aimed right for the heart. Before she can hit the ground, Dean has her in his arms.

Dying isn't how Hollywood shows it. It isn't instant, or pretty. It's slow, ugly, torturous.

Dean's hand presses up against the wound in her skin, feels her heartbeat underneath his palm. He's borderline hysterical, tears in his eyes and the sobbing already following behind. Katherine's eyes are swimming. And he starts to cry. It's instant.

"It's okay," she whispers. "It—it's okay. It's okay." He shakes his head. "I'm okay. We're okay." She manages a smile, as faltering as it is, and curls his jacket in her fist.

"It's not—it's not. Just—God!" She didn't notice his fingers tighten around her.

She rests her head on his shoulder, breathing shallow, though she's doing her best to reign it in. She can feel herself dying...she can feel her blood leave her body. Parts of her skin are warmer than usual, her toes are colder than usual. She feels lightheaded, how she feels sometimes when she donates blood, and sick to her stomach. She can feel her lips getting cold.

Heat won't do anything for her. It's her body pulling blood to vital organs. Any moment now, she'll throw up.

"I remember," she whispers, carefully moving to lift her head, her lips on his throat. Dean supports her neck on his arm and she finds it in herself to relax some. "I remember when I saw you for the first time since I was a teenager." Her voice cracks and tears spill from the corners of her eyes. She manages a smile. "I was gonna kick your ass."

Dean doesn't even snag on teenager.

"I don't doubt it," Dean says. He can't smile. He did this. Everything is his fault, starting with the accident last summer. If he hadn't been brought back, end result, Katherine wouldn't be bleeding out so painfully, so slowly.

No...this is nothing like the movies.

"But..." She swallows, blue eyes drifting a bit, losing their clarity, their focus.

"Hey, no, no, no," Dean says, tilting her chin to him. She blinks hard, swallowing just the same, and takes a deep, labored breath. "Look at me, all right? Just look at me." His voice wavers. She flinches as his tears hit her cheek.

She hasn't seen him cry before. Katherine weakly reaches up to his face, resting her slippery palm against his cheek.

"You know, I...prayed...the night before you broke into my apartment, I prayed for something better." She winces, her back tensing as she grits her teeth. "I prayed I could have something better."

Dean's expression contorts...pain, sorrow...he isn't sure which. "And you think that was me?"

She smiles and nods. "Yes," she whispers. "And, you know...I think you once asked me about my favorite day." She grits her teeth and grunts.

"Hey, hey—take it easy." Everyone notices the two now. The gate is shut. "Just take it easy, darlin'."

Katherine sobs. "You know, I never told you how much I love it when you call me that," she chokes out.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," she nods. "'Cause you never called the other bimbos that." He manages a laugh as Katherine flashes him a weak smile. Her hand has dropped from his face now. And any moment, she'll run out of blood, out of moments to say everything she wants. Everything she was too stubborn to say. She feels nothing but white-hot panic. And cold. Oh, Charlie— "My favorite day...Hell, I'm sure I lied to you about this, but it was...it was that day...when I found you in my bedroom. You were...messing with my jewelry box, knocked over a wine glass on my desk. Somehow I knew nothing was gonna be the same again."

Dean pulls her closer. "Yeah. Yeah, that's my favorite day, too."

She sniffs. "Don't you lie to me."

"I'm not," he says, smiling as he shakes his head. "God, Katherine, I'm not. All of my favorite days, they've been with you." She lets out a small grunt, her fingers crushing his in her grip. "And I'm sorry I've been such a stubborn ass. I'm so sorry—I let you down, I just—"

"No, shhno." She's choking now. "It—it's okay." Katherine shakes her head, and Dean starts to sob. "Nononono, shhhh. It's okay. It's okay." She swallows and nods again. Charlie. Her hands are trembling, losing their heat. "It's okay, it's okay," she whispers, closing her eyes.

But she can't bring herself to talk about him.

"I can't lose you, too, Katherine," Dean whispers. "I can't lose you too."

"You know," she murmurs, and swallows thickly. "I don't think I'd ever tell you this if I wasn't dying." She manages to pull her eyelids open one last time. Just to look at him. All of him. His tears, the red in his eyes. The freckles on his flushed skin. The pull of his lips. "Awkward."

"You're a guy?"

Katherine manages a laugh. And then another, finished with a high-pitched whine. "I love you, Dean. And n-n-nobody, nobody, can take that away." She nods, gripping his chin between her fingers. "Nobody. Just don't—don't say it back, okay?" She lets out a slow, pained breath, her features twisting. "You're not that guy. We're not those people. Just...just don't tell Charlie how bad this was, okay?"

"But what if I do?" Dean asks, brushing Charlie to the side. 

He's given up on the whole applying pressure thing. Katherine's a doctor and she's pried his hand away from her chest too many times to count. If there was a snowball's chance in Hell for her, she wouldn't have done that.

"Can you get fireworks to my funeral?" She whispers.

"Fireworks," Dean chuckles, tears blurring his vision. He can't see her face. "You want fireworks?"

"Hell yeah," Katherine grunts. Her heart is beating faster in the grips of death. She can see a reaper coming towards her, moving past Sam—Sam? But there's something else. It's a bright white light, almost as blinding as the sun, rocketing from the sky. It's impossible to miss in all of that blackness. Dean watches her blue-gray eyes focus on that light, the light he doesn't see. He doesn't even look up. "Don't forget the damn sparklers."

"Why sparklers?" He sniffs. "They're so wussy."

"I like 'em," she strains. Then she starts to cry, staring at that fast-approaching meteor. Wings... "I don't want to die, Dean."

"I know. I know. I'm so sorry, Katherine, I'm so—" She's breathing faster. "Hey. Hey, no! No, no, no! Katherine, don't you dare—! No! Nooooo!"

Her hands are still trembling against his chest, but her heart is still.