The bunker felt colder that night. Not the usual chill of concrete walls and buzzing old lights—but something deeper, like regret hanging in the air.

The pentagram was nearly finished, drawn in steady strokes of chalk across the war room floor. Sam was quiet, methodical. Dean’s hand moved slower. Not from doubt—he wouldn’t admit that—but from something else. Memory, maybe. Something rough and clawing just beneath his ribs.

Outside, thunder rolled. Storms always seemed to follow her.

Dean straightened, wiping his palms on his jeans, heart thudding in uneven beats. The circle was perfect. Contained. Final.

She’d been helping them for months. Turning tides in battles that should’ve been lost. Saving Sam once, even. Dean more than once, but who was counting?

She was still a demon. That should’ve meant everything.

But it didn’t—not anymore.

He remembered her laugh, sharp and low in the dark after a hunt gone sideways. The way she looked at him when no one else was watching. Like she saw something in him that even he couldn’t name. Maybe that’s what made this worse. Maybe that’s why it had taken so long.

Sam lit the candles.

Dean stared at the center of the pentagram like it might swallow him whole. He didn’t look at his brother. Didn’t have to. This had to be done. She crossed lines just by existing—and so had he, the first time he let her walk away unharmed.

He clenched his fists, jaw tight. She would come when they called. She always did. That was the problem.

The rain outside thickened, tapping against the metal like it was trying to get in.

Dean took a breath, eyes still locked on the circle.