Chapter Text
Sam Winchester had no idea he was summon-able. Sure, he’d had run-ins with witches and demons and angels and gods and who knows what else, and yes, he’d most definitely been caught in the traps and tricks and spells of all of the above, but summoning circles? Did that shit even work?
From what he recalled, he and Dean had only ever tried with Death and… well, technically, the second time getting Lucifer out of the cage should count, too. And the crossroads were basically summons-
The point was, though, that the ‘summonings’ had all been for supernatural beings with preclusions to greatness, and Sam? He fell into neither category these days. Maybe once upon a time, the demon blood running through his veins would have fulfilled the first condition, but not now. (And never the greatness.)
Still, he found himself summoned. More the harm, he found himself summoned away in the middle of a fight with a particularly nasty ghoul who was clinging on to life in ways ghouls generally refused to do. Then again, Sam had finished off two of its family members in front of its eyes, so that had to be a particularly defining factor.
The only one he had with him on this hunt was Jack, who was watching from the car because Dean hadn’t felt safe enough to let him go alone, even though they’d hit a lull with Michael still under the radar. Sam hadn’t wanted to leave Dean alone, either, but he knew the cooped-up thing was only made worse with his hovering, so he’d chosen to go out and relax with a run-of-the-mill hunt. It wasn’t like anything would go-
Oh, right. The summoning. Maybe Dean had a point about the whole pairing-up thing.
Sam felt some sort of energy wrap around him, and it seemed to be prominent to the ghoul, too, because the creature was hissing and falling back, and Sam’s eyes instead snapped right back to Jack, who was still in his seat, his eyes slowly widening as he realized something was going horribly, terribly, wrong.
And then the world vanished right in front of him.
Sam felt lightning squeeze through his body, light up the blood in his veins, and flow out through his mouth and his eyes. He felt the darkness pull up around him and then suffocate him, only to be chased away by the light that he could feel thrumming under his skin, and he wasn’t even able to scream because-
He inhaled, too ragged, too deep, and too sudden to understand that he’d just landed on solid ground, and he could feel himself again. He stilled.
Wait… His breathing evened forcefully, and his hand instantly went to his waistband, to the knife in its sheath. The gun, he was pretty sure, had slipped from his hand when this… thing had begun to happen, but at least he was not without a weapon. He unsheathed it and looked up, only to meet the inky black eyes of a satisfied-looking demon.
His eyes adjusted. Scratch that. Demons.
He narrowed his eyes and did an immediate headcount, coming up with a staggering twenty.
What the hell were they doing? Had they come to challenge him again, just as Kipling had that little while ago? Had they learned nothing? He glared.
“All hail-” One demon began, but Sam didn’t let him continue. He darted in and stabbed the bastard, not waiting for the knife to show it had worked its magic before moving on to the second demon. The others stared, watching him as he took down two, three-
They weren’t stopping him?
Sam stopped.
The fifteen or so remaining demons still stared, eyes wide and expressions somehow gleeful. What the hell were they planning? Was Sam killing the demons somehow part of their plan? If so, to what end?
He stepped back. “What do you want?” He demanded, and to his utter surprise and practical horror, the demon closest to him fell to his knees.
“All hail the king of hell!” He announced, and the other demons followed.
And suddenly, all Sam could think was, ‘ Shit.’
Jack stared at the place where the ghoul was still cowering, held in place by something that he couldn’t himself comprehend. And then it scampered away, leaving its meal behind, which should have been a sign in and of itself.
But Jack could only stare and stare and stare because Sam was gone. Sam had disappeared, and there was- there was nothing-
His lips began to tremble, and he cursed Lucifer more than he ever had before. Sam was gone, and there was nothing Jack could do about it.
He stumbled out of the car and over to the very spot his Sam had vanished and felt something shift in the air. It was something strange, like a mix of magic and dimension and- and- something, and Jack had the sudden debilitating fear that Sam was somehow trapped in yet another dimension. Except this time, Jack couldn’t go and save him because he no longer had any powers. He was nothing.
Human. He was a small, pathetic hUmAN-
No, Sam’s voice said in his mind, clear and oh-so-warm. Jack flinched. You might be human now, but you’re not pathetic.
Jack swallowed. Right. Sam was human. Dean was human. Neither of them was in any way lesser than Jack had ever been. Hell, they were better than he’d been with powers!
Dean was better.
Dean could help.
Dean could save Sam.
He ran back to the car, strides longer than they’d ever been, and, with shaking hands, dialed Dean’s number. In his hurry, he didn’t even realize he was using Sam’s phone, but Dean answered with a grouchy “Whaddaya want, Sammy?” and Jack knew automatically.
Except he had no time to waste. “Dean?” He said urgently.
Dean was instantly more awake than he’d been seconds ago. “Jack? Is Sam driving?”
He wouldn’t be so worried if he was, Jack knew, but he had to say it anyway. “Sam- Dean, Sam, he- he-” His hands curled tighter around the phone, and his eyes filled with tears. “Sam disappeared.”
Dean swore. “Where are you? I’m coming.”