The Angel, The Hunter and The Nephilim (Destiel x Daughter)

17. She Knows

"Hey, Leah, there's someone at the door. Can you go check who it is? I'm a little preoccupied," Dean calls out to his daughter from the guest room upstairs in their little house.
She peeks her head out of the living room where she's been watching some terrible random TV show for about an hour. Cas is away to visit an old friend, and there's only the father and daughter in the house.
Leah steps out of the living room and heads over to the front door. She opens, and who else should she see...
Michael.
The tall blond boy Dean never liked, who was never really good to Leah. Cas had tried to give him the benefit of the doubt, but Dean got strange vibes and never really wanted him near his family, least of all his daughter. Michael is wearing a malicious grin on his face, and Leah immediately takes a step back and tries to slam the door in his face, but he's quicker on the draw and grabs her arm.
"Dad," Leah screams to her father on the second floor. But when she looks around, she's not even at home anymore. Dean is not around to help when she's being tackled and slammed to the floor. She tries to fight back, but he's stronger, and she can't combat what happens next.

Leah shoots up from her pillows, sobbing, her heart pounding like a drum, the air is too thin, she's hyperventilating. Sweat is running down her back, her forehead, tears that roll down her face and melt into her sweaty palms. Wanting to fight this awful crippling fear and calming down, she struggles to be as quiet as she absolutely can, trying to find out if she screamed when she woke up so that she could have woken Sam or Madison.
But then a few seconds pass and it's still quiet and being alone here in the silence makes everything so much worse. Leah takes a deep breath, as deep as she can to try to calm down, but it does nothing, she throws off her blanket and rushes up on her feet. Trying to get her legs to work with the prickling sensation and feeling like they're being stabbed by acupuncture needles, she makes her way out of the bedroom and down the hall toward her uncle's room, stumbling, barely able to walk, using the wall as a crutch.
Then finally the deafening silence is broken by someone else, after what feels like hours. A door opens on the left side in front of her when she's just a couple of feet away from Sam's bedroom, and her tired-eyed aunt wanders out of the bathroom and peeks out of the messy nest of brown hair on her head when she sees movement from the corner of her eye.
"Leah, what are you doing u-..." she stops mid word and her eyes widen, the drowsiness ceases immediately when she realizes that something's wrong.
"Oh my god." She rushes over to her niece, grabbing her shoulders tightly. "Leah, honey, what's wrong? What happened, did you have a nightmare?"
"I can't breathe," Leah stutters and gasps and she falls to her knees in the hallway, clutching her own neck as if she's gonna be able to crush the thing that's not allowing her to breathe.
This is a nightmare. This has to be a nightmare.
"Sam," Madison cries out in horror. "Sammy, emergency!" she kneels down to sit with her niece to try to help her while the uncle gets up to assess the situation. Sam is standing in the doorway less than ten seconds later, wearing dark blue pajama pants and a white shirt, and he rushes over and kneels down, taking Leah's face in his hands.
"Leah, talk to me. What's happening?"
"I just woke up and I didn't know where I was and I could see him everywhere and I got so scared, and it hurts, and-", she closes her eyes but the look on her ex boyfriend's face, his grin that made her freeze up in panic forces her eyes open, she looks up at her uncle instead.
"Get the telephone, god damn it," Madison screams at her husband, and he's up and running again, two seconds later he gets back with his phone.
"Alright, who exactly is it that you want me to call?" he asks. "Dean or an ambulance?"
"Yeah, because Dean can be here by the time your niece loses consciousness," she cries at him, the sarcasm unintended in the stressful situation.
Sam shakes his head and dials 911.
"Breathe with me, honey," Madison says and tries to coach her niece, but it's hard when she doesn't know why Leah is choking. She's crying too, now, but trying to stay strong for the sake of all. Leah needs them both right now.
"I need to hear dad's voice," Leah gasps. "I need to tell him-"
"You're not dying, Leah, you're not gonna die and I'll make sure of it," Sam asserts. "Not while Dean is in another state." He kneels down after making the 911 call and pulls his niece up in his arms, holding her so she can rest in his arms while Madison tries to help her. He presses the '2' button on his phone for speed dial and it immediately dials Dean's number. He puts the call on speaker and it rings three times before his brother answers. By that time Leah's breathing problems have already given off a little, but now starts the panic.
What's happening? And why is her entire body hurting?
"Sam? Why the hell are you calling me in the middle of the night?" Dean groans on the other line, his voice groggy, annoyed, and Sam realizes how tired he would have been, too, if he didn't think his brother's daughter was dying in his arms right now.
"Something happened. We've already called the ambulance, they're on their way. Leah just needed to hear your voice."
"Oh my god. What happened?"
Through the speaker phone, Leah, Sam and Madison can hear Dean get out of bed and start pacing nervously around.
"Well?! Can I talk to her or something?"
Sam looks down and sees Leah laying there in his arms while his wife holds up her head and strokes her hair, and he sees the fear soothed slightly just by hearing her dad's voice. But it's not enough. In all his years as a hunter, he's never seen anyone this afraid, ever, and it's messing him up, knowing he's responsible for someone else's child.
"Dean, when I dialed your number twenty seconds ago, she couldn't even breathe."
"Son of a bitch," Dean shouts through gritted teeth and slams something over so it breaks.
"Whoa," they hear in the background. "Dean, what's wrong?" Cas' voice.
"What's wrong is we're in the wrong state when our daughter needs us," he howls to his husband. "Sam, man, tell me she's at least conscious."
"Barely," Sam whispers, but he takes a deep breath of relief when he hears the sirens not far from the house.
"Am I on speaker?" Dean asks, hoping he can get through to his daughter.
"Yes."
"Can she hear me?"
"She can always hear you, Dean. But she already knows."
"Leah, baby," Dean says through the line, his voice shaking. "Don't you dare go longer than to that hospital. You understand me? Me and dad are coming right now. Please don't be scared," he says, he takes another deep breath to steady himself in his overwhelming concern for his only child.
"Please don't be scared, because it's gonna be alright."
"The ambulance is here, I gotta go down and meet them," Sam says, but Madison shakes her head and gets up.
"I'll go get them. Make sure she's okay," she whispers and nods to her niece.
"I love you, Leah Allison Winchester, and don't you ever forget that, alright?" Dean says through the line, he's nearly paralyzed in his helplessness, and Sam starts to fear everything is becoming way too much for his brother.
"She's not going to die," Cas says in the background. As usual, he tries to sound strong and calm and be the rational of the two, but he really isn't doing a good job this time, they can all hear his voice shaking as well.
Dean cries out and something else breaks when it hits the floor. Cas quickly grabs Dean's phone from his hand before his husband breaks that as well.
"We're coming," he says. "We love her. Let her know we love her."
"She knows," Sam whispers and lets the phone sink slowly into the pocket of his sweatpants. He looks down at his niece and realizes her eyes have shut and she's fighting for air again.
Thankfully, in the next second, paramedics are blocking the hallway, pulling the unconscious young Winchester onto a gurney. Sam rushes into his bedroom and gets his clothes on so he's suitable for a hospital run. On his way out and down the stairs, he sees a pool of blood on the dark wooden floor where Leah was laying.
Madison is downstairs in the hall when they get there, she's sobbing desperately in fear and Sam, knowing that they don't have the time that they need, begs her to come with them so they can talk.
"I'll be fine, Sam, go with her. I'll be fine, I promise. I'm gonna take the car, I just need a second. Hurry out to the ambulance!"
Sam nods and places a hurried kiss on her forehead before he jumps into his shoes and reaches the ambulance just in time to go with them.