Supernatural: Carved in Flesh (30 page)

“Oh, we’ll come after you eventually,” Dean said. “Assuming the Leviathan don’t make a meal out of us. But that’s down the road. What we’re talking about now is what it’s going to take for you to live long enough to get out of town.”

“I must admit, it’s an intriguing offer.”

Dippel looked as if he might be considering it, but Marshall’s fear of the flare seemed to be fading. He stepped closer to the edge of the deck, and the black energy began to swirl around his arms once again. He no longer looked afraid. He looked angry.

This,
Sam thought,
is bullshit.

He shifted his sawed-off shotgun to his left hand, drew his Beretta, took aim at Marshall Luss, and fired.

Catherine stood next to the defibrillator, finger poised above the activation button. Bekah’s head and chest were wrapped tight in the treated cloth strips, and the rest of her body appeared whole and unmarred. The IV needles had been inserted at various junctures and had delivered the chemicals into her vascular system, and the AED’s sensors had been attached, one to her upper chest, one to her lower. Her flesh showed no sign of decay, and the NuFlesh scars were less noticeable on her than on Marshall. Catherine knew it was sexist of her, but she’d taken more care with Bekah than Marshall because she thought the scarring issue would matter more to a young woman than it would to a middle-aged man. She didn’t think Marshall would mind.

She jumped when she heard the distant sound of shattering glass.

It’s started.

She knew she should activate the defibrillator, but she hesitated. Had she administered the IV chemicals in the right dosages? Properly positioned the Lapis Occultus on Bekah’s forehead? She’d told Conrad that enough battery power remained to operate the AED, but what if she’d miscalculated? What if she had made a mistake somewhere along the line? The smallest error could negatively affect the outcome, and if the procedure didn’t work, if Bekah didn’t return to life, Catherine feared she might not get another chance. It wouldn’t matter if Marshall and Conrad defeated the hunters, not if Bekah’s body was so damaged due to her bungling that it couldn’t be salvaged. Bekah would die a second death before she could be reborn, and after that, resurrection would no longer be possible.

Catherine felt the temperature in the basement drop, as if the central air had been turned on and the thermostat set to “cold as ice.” Shadows gathered from every corner of the room, sliding across the floor toward her like sinuous black serpents. She watched with a mixture of awe and dread as the shadows merged to form a swirling whirlpool of darkness. A moment later a figure rose from the ebon mass, a woman with marble-white skin who wore the shadows around her like a cloak of night. Her eyes were solid obsidian, and her lips the bright red of arterial spray. She was the most beautiful being, male or female, that Catherine had ever seen.

The woman’s mouth didn’t move, but Catherine heard her speak nonetheless.

Fear not, my daughter. Your work has been exemplary. This body is both comely and strong, and with the aid of the Lapis Occultus, it shall contain the whole of my power without ill effect. It will be the perfect vessel. All you need do is release the tiny lightning, and your daughter will not only draw breath again, she shall truly be reborn, becoming something far more than you ever dreamed possible.

The voice was cold but hypnotic, a winter wind whispering across a snow-covered plain in the dead of night. Catherine felt compelled to obey, and if she noted the woman’s use of the word vessel, it did not trouble her. She smiled as she gazed into the limitless dark depths of the woman’s eyes, and she pressed the defibrillator’s button.

* * *

Dean saw blood mist from Marshall Luss’s right shoulder the same instant he heard the crack of Sam’s Beretta going off. He didn’t know what he was angrier about, that Sam had shot before he could negotiate a deal with Dippel, or that he’d missed doing any real damage to Marshall.

His aim’s off because he’s so sick,
Dean thought.
Hell, he’s probably lucky he still has the strength to hold the damned gun and squeeze the trigger.
Taking all that into consideration, he supposed it wasn’t that bad of a shot after all. Still, it pissed him off, and it didn’t leave him much choice about what to do next.

He hurled the flare toward Marshall, and before it could strike him, he switched the Winchester into a firing position and let ’er rip.

Marshall brought up his hands to shield his face and took a step back as the burning flare tumbled toward him. His feet were still slick with blood, and that’s what saved his life—or unlife, as the case might be. His feet slid out from under him and he fell backward just as Dean fired his shotgun. Marshall slammed to the deck, glass shards lodging in his back. The flare hit the deck, bounced a couple times, then rolled to a stop six feet from him. The wood beneath the blazing tip blackened and began to burn. Marshall jumped to his feet and pointed at the flare.

“Fy-uh!” he shouted. “Fy-uh!”

He sounded like a four-year-old, maybe younger. Hearing a child’s halting attempt at language come out of a grown man’s mouth filled Dean with both pity and rage. As much as he hated monsters, he viewed most of them as not much different than animals. They did what they did because it was their nature, but because they preyed on humans who didn’t believe in them and had no idea how to defend themselves, hunters like him and Sam—and Bobby and their dad—had to kill them. Demons were a different story, of course, and don’t get him started on friggin’ angels! But the poor reanimated son of a bitch that was Marshall Luss hadn’t asked to become an undead
thing,
and he’d still be resting in peace if it wasn’t for Conrad “Just call me the mad alchemist” Dippel. He was the real monster.

“You know, Sam, it’s been a while since we had ourselves a good old-fashioned barbecue.”

He dropped the Winchester to the ground, took hold of the flamethrower’s nozzle, and started running toward the deck. Although the fire stream had a fifteen-foot range, he wanted to get good and close before unleashing hell so he could make every lick of flame count. He could hear kerosene slosh as he ran, and he couldn’t wait to empty the whole damned container on Dippel.

Dippel looked less than impressed by Dean’s charge. He reached into a pocket of his pants, pulled out a fistful of powder, and tossed it at the flare, barking a few harsh words in what Dean supposed was German as he did so. The powder transformed into water in midair and splashed down onto the flare, dousing both it and the flames around it.

Dippel turned to face Dean, reaching into his pocket for more powder.

Dean came to a halt three yards from Dippel, raised the flamethrower’s nozzle, and thumbed the switch.

“Flame on!” he shouted.

A stream of fire shot from the flamethrower’s nozzle and arced toward Dippel just as the alchemist hurled the rain powder and shouted more German. But Dean wasn’t aiming directly at Dippel. Instead, he aimed at the deck around Dippel’s feet, stepping to the side as he fired to avoid the powder—now water—coming at him. Flaming liquid splashed onto the deck, causing Marshall to shriek in terror and leap into the yard to get away from the “Fy-uh.” Dean would deal with him later. Right now his primary objective was to cook himself up a little Southern fried Dippel.

He’d forgotten the powder-turned-water was magical in origin, however, and instead of splashing harmlessly to the ground, it changed trajectory in midair and curved toward the flamethrower’s nozzle. Before Dean could react, it struck the nozzle and flowed into it, the water moving as if it was alive. The fire cut off at once, and although Dean thumbed the release button several times, all that came out were thin streams of decidedly not-flaming liquid. The flames he’d already ignited on the deck were spreading, but none had reached Dippel yet, and the alchemist was hard at work using more of his magic water-powder to douse the fire.

Some Human Torch you turned out to be,
Dean thought.

He caught movement from the corner of his eye and turned just in time to see Marshall Luss running toward him, features contorted into a mask of rage, bloody hands stretched out, fingers curled into fists.

“Fy-uh bad!” he bellowed. “You bad!”

“Sam? A little help?”

No reply. Dean’s gut twisted with a cold, sick feeling, he looked over his shoulder to see Sam lying on the ground, still clutching his Beretta, eyes closed, body still. Dean couldn’t tell if his brother was still breathing, but he couldn’t afford to waste any more time fighting. He needed Dippel’s help.

Marshall slammed into him with all the ferocity of a pro linebacker. The resurrected man wrapped his arms around Dean as he hit, and the impact carried them both to the ground. Dean tried to twist out of Marshall’s grip on the way down, but the man was strong as hell—probably way stronger than he’d been in life—and he was unable to break free. Dean’s breath was forced out of his lungs as he struck the ground, Marshall still holding tight to him. Under other circumstances, Dean might have found it more than a little awkward to have a naked man lying on top of him, but just then he had bigger concerns. The longer it took him to get Sam help, the greater the chance that his brother would die. His thoughts raced as he desperately tried to think of a way to break the man’s iron grip. Then he felt a familiar draining sensation, as if the life was being sucked out of him. He remembered Sam telling him that Marshall had the same ability to drain life force as Frankenmutt and the Double-Header. If he didn’t get away from Marshall fast, he’d be sucked drier than a juice box on a desert playground at high noon. Dean thrashed and kicked, but nothing he did helped, and he could already feel himself growing weaker. A few more moments, and it would be over. His worst nightmare would have come true. He’d have failed to carry out the charge his father had given him so many years ago: to take care of his younger brother. More than that, he would have failed to kill that slimy land-shark Dick Roman and avenge Bobby’s death.

Looks like I’ll be joining you in the Happy Hunting Ground, you old grump,
Dean thought.
Hope you got a cold one waiting for me.

He continued struggling, but it was getting harder to move. It would be so much easier to lie back, close his eyes, and allow himself to slip away. No more killing, no more feeling like he carried the whole damn world on his back, like everyone’s lives depended on him not screwing up. In a lot of ways, death would come as a relief. All he had to do was stop fighting...

“Hold!”

A woman’s voice. No, a teenage girl’s.

Dean immediately felt the draining sensation stop. Marshall released him and rose to his feet. Dean was too weak for the moment to do anything but lie where he was and watch.

Dippel knelt on the scorched deck, head bowed. A woman Dean presumed was Catherine Luss stood next to him, gazing with adoration upon a brown-haired, barefoot girl dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, both black. On the shirt in white letters:
I’m only wearing black until they make something darker.
In her right hand, the girl held a dark blue stone.

She looked at Dean. “My apologies. I would have been here sooner, but I insisted on finding something to wear first. Do you like it?” She twirled around to display her outfit. “To the Norse people, the color black symbolized new beginnings, just as night heralds the birth of day, and winter the birth of summer. I thought it appropriate considering that today is the day of
my
birth, in a sense.”

Norse?
Dean thought. Then he registered the way Dippel was kneeling before her, like she was some kind of...

He moaned as he struggled to a sitting position. “Don’t tell me we’re dealing with another friggin’ god! I am so sick of you guys! You’re nothing but stuck-up monsters with delusions of grandeur.”

The girl bristled but maintained her composure. “I am Hel. Just one L. The Vikings worshipped me as the embodiment of death.”

“Well, the Vikings were dumbasses then, ’cause I’ve met capital-D Death, lady, and believe me, you aren’t him. But you’re not a teenage girl either, are you? You’re just using the doctor’s daughter as a meat suit. I’ve seen that trick before, too.”

Dean still felt weak as a half-drowned kitten, but he could feel his strength returning bit by bit. He wanted to keep Hel talking to give himself more time to recover. He glanced at Marshall. The doctor’s Frankenhubby stood staring at Hel, an empty expression on his face. Dean wondered if the man had enough beans left in his
cabeza
to recognize his daughter, and if so, somewhere inside his mind, was he shouting in anger at what had been done to her? Not that the good lady doctor seemed upset. From the way she was beaming at the goddess, it looked as if she was ready to join the First Church of Hel, get baptized, and run for Pope.

He glanced at Sam, but saw no change. He still lay there, unconscious or worse. Dean didn’t know if he could work a deal with Hel, but despite Sam’s warning against making pacts with dark powers, he had to try. His brother’s life depended on it.