"Wait!", Jenna called, taking a few steps after Harry, "You can't just... leave me here!"

"Oh, hell yes, we can. You better go and call this in. We take care of the monsters. You don't want to get involved.", Harry told her sternly. He was so not in the mood for motivated civilians. His head was still throbbing, his chest hurt, and the Winchesters were already enough of a hassle with their questions. Although he had to admit, they were pretty entertaining.

"Gramps over here is right, Jenna.", Dean unexpectedly agreed, "This shit is gonna get ugly, and we're better equipped to handle it."

"But these are my people being infected and killed! I went to school with these guys and their sisters! I NEED to see this through."

"Need, mh?", Harry frowned. He got that feeling, "Fine. Boys, she's coming."

"Oh, for...", Dean started, but his brother interrupted him: "Just... let's just roll with it for now, okay? One problem at a time."

"He should be thankful we don't leave him behind.", Dean growled.

"Excuse me? I can actually do something about this Darkness. What are you going to do? Smolder and hope it digs that?"

"Sm... dude.", Dean threw up his arms.

"Less talking. More moving. Or I'll leave you behind.", Harry decided, and held the door open for Jenna.

"And then what? You gonna fly there?", Dean taunted.

"Dean, he might actually be able to do that."

"Thank you, Sam. Yes, that's what I would do. But since YOU unleashed this thing, I'll let you tag along for now.", Harry added, and sat down in the back seat next to Jenna.

"They did what?!"

"I might shoot him.", Dean growled at his brother, as he finally started the car.

"Go ahead. I could use a laugh.", Harry chirped.

"Stop it! Both of you!", Sam almost shouted.

"Dude, you just yelled at the Master of Death.", Dean whispered smugly.

"Dean, I swear, man, just shut it!"

They drove in silence for about two minutes before Jenna quietly asked: "Master of Death?"

"Oh, don't worry. It's more of an honorary title thing.

Silence.

The entrance of the small hospital was pure chaos. There was a truck belonging to the road crew, clearly signaling how trouble had found the people here. Sam and Dean wanted to stock up on weapons, but Harry was finally out of patience and just marched ahead, with Jenna following him like a shadow. She had obviously realized he was the guy for this kind of crazy. Inside everything was destroyed, bodies lying on the floor, hunched over desks... and the telephone ringing on a loop.

"Oh God.", Jenna groaned.

"That way.", Harry nodded, following the energy he felt ahead. Sam and Dean followed, their guns drawn.

"No shooting, please.", Harry told them sternly, as they walked past more bodies, "I need one alive."

"As long as none of those freaks come near us, sure.", Dean agreed, but his gun stayed at the ready. More Harry really couldn't expect.

And theeeeere he was. A member of the road crew, viciously banging at a closet door and behind it...

"It's here...", Harry explained, "And somehow it has already gotten stronger. Damn it."

He waved his arm and the infected man fell to the ground. Unconscious. Harry hurried to kneel down beside him, and put a careful hand on the black streaks marking his neck and head.

"What is it?", Sam asked, kneeling down as well.

"Nothing. It's... nothing. It feels like... I can't describe it, really. Like, well, Darkness is slowly creeping through his blood, eating his soul."

The soft mewling of a newborn sounded out from behind the door. A baby, damn it. Harry narrowed his eyes. He hated it when kids were involved. More than everything else, ever. He could understand, accept and forgive a lot of things. He had seen too much not to. But kids. Kids were another story.

"Dude, you are starting to glow.", Dean said somewhere behind him, but Harry had trouble hearing him clearly. His ears were ringing. His vision blurred. Ice-cold fury was pumping through his veins. This Darkness thing was done for. And if it took him down with it, all the better.

The air surrounding him started to churn with energy, and his three companions stepped back. He could feel it. There. Behind the door. That entity pulling out this man's soul. As long as he was alive, they were connected. And Harry was so done. This thing would not get this soul. Deeper and deeper, Harry sunk his own power into the unconscious victim, and then: pulled. The man's body jolted up, his head still held down by Harry, and behind the door the baby started to cry in earnest.

Don't let it have taken over the baby, Harry thought. Let it only be the infected one in there.

The man started to seize, the baby cried harder and somewhere in his periphery Harry could see Dean trying to make it to the door without walking too close to Harry.

And then, just like that, it was over.

Everything fell silent, no one moved.

"Did it work?", Sam asked, his voice carefully neutral.

Harry lifted his hands. The marks were gone, and he could feel it, almost see it: the man's soul was whole and safe again.

"I'll be damned.", Dean breathed out loudly, "Now let's help that poor baby."

Harry sighed and opened the door from afar.

A terrified man was standing inside the closet, a still fuzzy looking newborn in blankets cradled in his arms. Harry took another step to get a better feel for the situation, but he couldn't disentangle their energies.

"Sir, we are here to help. We just need you to get out of there, so we can help you.", Sam started.

"Mike?", Jenna asked, "These guys are the real deal. They helped me earlier."

"Jenna? I don't understand. What's going on here?"

"Okay, Mike, please hand the baby over to Jenna. Just for a second.", Harry wearily watched the two. He needed to know which one was the soul-eating Big Bad, although he was pretty sure he already knew.

"Hell no. My daughter stays with me!"

"Harry, maybe we should take this somewhere more... private?", Sam tried carefully.

"No, we need to settle this. One of them is infected, and I'd really like to change that. Now.", Harry hissed, his temper flaring up. Babies, man. Why babies?

"Okay, Mike? Did you see the guy come in? Did he go after you?"

"Yes. They... they came in together. In a truck. Road crew. I ran back in to get... to get my daughter. They..."

"Did they cut you or bleed on you?", Dean took over from his brother.

"Yes. I... I can feel it. Something is wrong."

Harry closed his eyes, took a deep breath and said: "Then please hand the baby over to someone else and let me help you. Before you go and do something stupid."

"That man that attacked us. You helped him, too?"

"Yes. And he is just unconscious. Not hurt."

Carefully Mike walked closer to Jenna and handed her the baby.

"Oh wow.", Jenna sighed, "She is so tiny."

The moment Mike had stepped back, Harry had him on the floor. Unconscious, too.

"Harry, man! The hell? This isn't helping with the trust!", Dean yelled.

"Jenna, step back further!", Harry barked and knelt close to Mike. He was infected, yes. And the baby was... not a baby.

Rage, more rage than Harry had felt in centuries.

Not now, Potter, not now. Don't think about it now. This. This was one of the times when he HATED not to be able to return souls. This poor baby had never even had a chance, before some body-snatching cosmic entity decided it needed a host. Not now. Not now.

He laid his hand on Mike's head and pulled, like he had done before. Mike wasn't nearly as far gone, so he didn't jerk at all. The baby on the other hand started crying, causing Jenna and the brothers to go into panic mode.

"Harry?!"

"Done.", Harry declared and let go of Mike, "Now hand me the baby, Jenna."

But Jenna stared at him in horror.

"What... what did this do to her?"

"Jenna, hand me the baby, before you get infected, too."

"She's infected? Are you sure?", Sam asked, more hopeful than skeptic.

"No, she IS the infection. That's not a baby. That's the Darkness."

Three people stared at him in horror and disbelief and Harry got that, he really, really did, but he didn't have time to... stop and think about what he would have to do. He just needed to get this done.

"Harry, are you sure?", Sam repeated, sounding almost resigned.

"Yes, that's not a baby. That's the thing that bloody ate the baby."

As if on cue, the thing yawned adorably. Great. Juuuuust great.

"Are you crazy? She's just a tiny baby!", Jenna protested and as Harry took a step towards her, she pulled out her gun and pointed at him, "Don't you dare! I don't care if you are a wizard. You are not killing a baby!"

"I wouldn't, actually. I'd..."

"Okay, no one shoot anyone. Jenna, you wait here with Mike and the baby, okay? Sam, Harry and I are gonna go in there", he pointed to a door to his right, "and talk this through. No one is killing babies here, okay?"

"Fine!", Harry barked and stomped through the door, followed closely by the Winchesters. Sam closed the door behind himself.

"You're sure about this?"

"No, Sam, I enjoy murdering babies. It's how I stay young.", Harry hissed, his voice practically dripping sarcasm.

"First: not helping. Second: It was the road crew that infected Mike, yeah? So what if the mist or whatever infected the road crew, because they were outside?"

"But we were outside, too.", Dean added.

"No, we were inside the car."

"And the Darkness tried to get in. So? Doesn't change anything.", Harry shrugged, "It probably made its way here as that cloud thing. Probably needed a host and moved past the crew on the way."

"What would it need a host for?", Sam asked.

"Short answer? As an anchor, I'd guess. Something so powerful can't just BE. It needs something to contain it. I can give you a very long answer involving magical theory, if you'd like."

"A host? Like angels and demons?", Sam frowned.

"Angels, yes. Demons, no. Angels can exist without, but if their energy bleeds out, living things might die. Demons are basically just mutilated ghosts. That has nothing to do with cosmic energy. Or, to be clearer, angels are fueled by cosmic energy via God, not their own."

"So because..."

"Sam, I know this is heaven for your nerdy brain, but can we talk about that later? Darkness first.", Dean interrupted his brother.

"The Darkness was probably still weak from imprisonment. Infecting those people gave her some power, but it's slow. A newborn, though... vulnerable. The soul is new and has just entered the body. Easy pickings."

"Fucking hell.", Dean's hand rubbed his head angrily, "Can you get it out, like with the others?"

"No. The Darkness is in every cell. And the soul is gone... or... maybe it was never there. If she slipped in before birth. Before the soul entered... mhhhh. I'll have to think about that. I honestly don't know. But I CAN tell you, there is no soul in there now."

"But if you pulled out the souls she had started to eat, then what's stopping her from going after...", Sam's eyes widened and Harry realized his mistake at the same time, threw open the door and stared at nothing. Jenna was gone, and she had taken the Darkness with her.

Harry didn't wait, he just apparated next to the Impala. The car was still there, so was the ambulance. But one of the cars to their left was gone.

"Merlin's soggy underpants! How could I have been this stupid?!", he cursed loudly, prepared to tear his own hair out. Millennia old Master of Death, my ass, he thought, I just lost a girl and a baby.