Chapter Text
Dean leans forward onto his elbows.
“And these visions? You think they’re from God?”
“Yeah, I mean, they’re only after I specifically reached out to him for guidance. And, like, there was a burning bush.”
“And you’re saying that God wants you to get help from Lucifer? After everything he’s done to you?”
“Believe me, Dean, I know. But He’s telling me this for a reason, we have to at least check it out.”
Dean is frowning, but he’s not dismissing the idea out of hand.
“Do you think he’s gonna—” Dean pauses, gestures widely. You know, ask to ride you?
Sam wrinkles his nose at Dean’s attempt at charades, then shakes his head noncommittally. Looks away.
“I don’t know. Maybe not, but…”
There’s a long deliberative pause. Dean breaks it with a sigh.
“Ok, yeah. I trust your judgement. Just, be safe, Sammy.”
Sam nods, jaw tight.
--
Now Sam’s in the Cage, with Lucifer. Again. His heart is hammering, but it’s as God told him it was going to be. He takes a deep breath in and lets it out slowly. God told him that when this happened he would feel calm, not like he would otherwise. Maybe it’s up to him to make that happen now. So he regards the Devil in front of his, in the middle of his sales pitch. God has led him this far, he supposes it’s his own call from here on out.
“You need me, Sam.”
“Maybe we do. Doesn’t mean I’m going to say yes.”
Lucifer steps forward, and Sam flinches and backs up until he hits the bars behind him.
Lucifer frowns. “Ah, Sammy, I’m not going to torture you. Not this time.”
Sam thinks. There’s no series of questioning that is give him any more information, no assurances that he can meaningfully ask for. They both know each other completely at this point, in this setting. They’ve both spent so much time here. They’re both tired.
Lucifer would probably say anything to get out of the Cage right now. Who wouldn’t? Defeating The Darkness would be in his own interest, though. And after that? Maybe that should be tomorrow’s problem.
Would he be able to live in a world where Lucifer walks the Earth again? Maybe that’s what God is asking him to find out.
Maybe Lucifer has even been weakened by this second stint in the Cage. Maybe that’s why God is offering him now as an option. What if Sam is being asked to trust now in God?
He has to trust, here, that God knows something that he doesn't. Sees something that he, in his limited mind, cannot.
Lucifer regards him as he thinks, as though he can see the cogs turning in Sam’s brain. Maybe he can.
Sam bites his tongue.
I trust your judgement. Be safe.
Well. Now or never.
“I don’t trust you. Not at all. But I’ll offer a deal. You want, well, whatever you want. I don’t really care. To restart the Apocalypse, to just kill people, to take a fucking bike ride around Nantucket.”
Lucifer makes a mocking noise. “I’m not going to restart the Apocalypse. Really, Sammy--”
Sam holds up a hand. “Spare me. I meant it when I said I don’t care. I’m not going to believe anything you say right now. But, okay” He grits his teeth. “Sure, take me for a ride. We’ll defeat the Darkness, and then we’ll see who wins to figure out what comes next.”
Lucifer hums in fake consideration. Of course he’s going to accept.
“Ok, I’ll take it.”
“Alright, then.” Sam steels himself for what comes next. “Yes.”
---
What comes next is a rush of intensity as Lucifer invades his consciousness, dragging him back in time to the last time this happened. He smells the warehouse in Detroit. He feels Dean’s skin splitting under his fists. He can’t catch his breath. He’s feels ice crystallizing on his skin, even though he can’t even feel anything. They’re back together and everything is horrible. The sky is closing in
He’s still more or less in control of his body, though, he thinks, which is something. He can flex his fingers and they actually move.
Lucifer hums from inside his head, reveling in the situation.
Lucifer flexes his right hand in front of him. When Sam instructs it to fall to his side, though, it does that as well.
You know, those visions.
Lucifer pauses, as if for dramatic effect. Sam can feel, with dawning horror, that Lucifer is savoring this moment.
That was never God in your head. That was me. It’s always been me.
Sam tries to reel back, but you can’t take a step away from something that’s inside of you, that moves with you. There’s no escape. And it begins to dawn on him, with horror, just exactly how badly he’s messed up.
When Lucifer speaks again, he’s contemplative.
You know, you used to be something. When you threw me into the Cage at Stull… I gotta say, you had balls, kid. Now, though? Well, I’m not sure.
Sam barely has time to begin formulating a defense before it’s over.
He sees his hand snap and he’s abruptly shifted out of consciousness, stuck in a box inside the recesses of his own mind. He doesn’t even get front-row seats like he used to have, to whatever horrible atrocities Lucifer is sure to begin conducting.
This time Lucifer has put him, of all paces, back in the psych ward where he almost died from his hallucinations. He wonders for a moment if Lucifer dug that out of Sam’s mind, or whether that was really him the whole time.
Anyway. Not the point right now. This whole gambit was evidently a colossal mistake. He wonders how he could possibly have been stupid enough to assume that God was really talking to him. Him, of all people.
Lucifer probably expects him to die in here, wasting away and cataloguing everything he’s done wrong to get him to this point. It’s tempting.
But now Lucifer has made a critical mistake, too.
Because last time Sam was in this psych ward, he was too tired to get angry, too exhausted and desperate to just fall asleep. Well, you don’t need to sleep when an archangel is possessing you. And now?
Sam can get pissed. Maybe he’s not quite there yet, but this is Lucifer, and he’s not about to unleash him on his family, on top of the already high-octane crisis they’re dealing with, just because he has terrible judgement and can’t make the call.
So, yeah. He’s pissed now. And he’s learned from the best at how to weaponize being a fucking nuisance.
---
It’s been three days now, by Sam’s admittedly imprecise measurement, of hollering, singing off key, breaking everything in the room, and generally using all of his effort to send beams out of the absolute worst vibes he can muster out of his enclosure out at Lucifer. He’s not quite sure if the metaphysics holds up, but finally his meditation practice is coming in handy. He sits there and just focuses, the way he used to when he was studying for the SATs with people yelling and blood spattering in the background. Focuses on every bit of horrible energy he can find within himself, every bit of anger or annoyance or anything he’s ever felt for Lucifer. For John and for Dean, too, when he needs to dig deeper. Dead solid focus of the most concentrated malicious intent aimed outward, to injure, inconvenience or even just annoy Lucifer.
Sam’s certain some of them are hitting their target, and finally he feels from the surface the smallest wince. The walls weaken for just a second, but a second is all Sam needs.
Sam focuses on everything that Lucifer has done to him and taken from him. For killing Jessica. For sending Ruby. For the demon blood, and Azazel. For Brady, so many years ago. For the Cage. For the memory of Dean’s blood on his fist. Of Cas going up in holy fire. For those hallucinations. For the fact that he’s been unclean since that nursery and he’ll die that way, too.
He redoubles his psychic attack.
Sam crashes back into his body in a moment of absolute disorientation.
His knees give out, and he sinks to the floor, sizing up the situation even as he goes down, tensing as he gets ready to fight. At some instinctive level, John’s training still holds.
Sam can tell that he’s not in the middle of a battle, at least. No one’s taken his moment of weakness to hurl him against a wall or try to kill him. So all told, not too bad.
Dean, Cas, Crowley and Rowena stand around him, staring. Dean in concern, Rowena in fear, Crowley in amusement, Cas in-- well, who knows.
From Dean’s body language he assumes there’s some sort of argument going on with the group. At least that much tracks.
Sam heaves himself back to standing.
“Can someone catch me up as to what the hell is going on?”
“Sammy?” There’s hope and apprehension in Dean’s gruff tone, but something’s not right.
"Yeah, for now. Lucifer is… I don’t know where he is. It’s not gonna last for long. We gotta get him under control before he busts back out. This was a mistake. I’m sorry.”
He hears the silence, and feels Dean’s wince more than he sees it.
“I’m missing something, aren’t I.”
Crowley takes the opportunity to cut in.
“Ah, Moose. Dean thinks that only Lucifer can stop the Darkness. He’s not going anywhere if your dear brother gets his way. Me, on the other hand, I want him back in the Cage just like you.”
Dean interjects. “Sam, it’s only getting worse out there.”
As if that’s all there is to say. And honestly, in any other situation that would be enough.
Dean’s the only one Sam would trust to save him from the Devil. He’s the only one who has. But he can’t-- he can’t do this again. He’s not strong enough to break out again when this goes sideways. Sam knows Lucifer better than Dean, better than anyone left alive.
“Dream bigger, Crowley. I want him dead.”
Dean makes an angry noise. “I know you don’t like him, Sam. I don’t either. I hate the guy more than almost anyone. I remember what he did to you. But we need him right now. And it’s not like we have a way to kill an archangel right now.”
“Isn’t Michael still in the cage? Bust him out.”
“Sam, I don’t-- we don’t have time for this right now. We need him to defeat The Darkness.”
Cas interjects. “I’m sorry, Sam, but Dean is right. This is the only way.”
“Ok, fine. We’ll kill him later. But I can’t hold him forever and I’m not working with him. So either one of you takes him or he gets back in the Cage. I’ll do it myself if that’s what it takes.” Sam’s voice cracks on the last, sort of undermining his ultimatum.
You’re bluffing. You can’t put me back in the Cage by yourself. You’re not strong enough.
Well, that answers the question of what happened to Lucifer, at least.
Yeah. I know.
Dean is apoplectic. “That’s not your call to make! He’s already out, thanks to you, and now we need him.”
Sam ignores this, turns to Rowena instead. She’s the one whose help he actually needs.
“Rowena, you know he always planned to kill you, as soon as you let him out.”
Rowena starts. “Ach, that’s not true. Lucifer rewards loyalty.”
Her uncertain eyes betray her.
“Does he, now. Rowena. Think about it. You’re the only one who can put him back in. Why would he keep you around to do that.”
Sam can see the moment it clicks for her and self-preservation wins out.
“Ok. I’ll do it.”
“How soon can you have it ready?” Sam closes his eyes, feels Lucifer knocking on the inside of his skull, slithering around like the serpent that he still is. “I can’t hold on much longer.”
Ruby, Azazel, Jessica.
Rowena hardens into work mode. “Five minutes, Samuel. And you have to hold on now because we’re both dead if he breaks out now.”
She calls out to Crowley. “Candles, Fergus. Now.”
---
It takes seven minutes, not five. And it’s the hardest thing Sam has ever done. Harder than breaking free in Stull, than the eternity in the Cage, than the Trials.
As Rowena finishes the incantation, Sam feels Cas’ hand on his shoulder. He leans into the touch, grateful for the grounding that comes with the unexpected support. He’s almost there. Then he hears Cas speak, a single conflicted syllable.
“Yes.”
And he hears Lucifer cackling as he loses, once again.