SPN gen fic: Sweet Caroline 8/11
Oct. 1st, 2008 08:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
superbadgirlTitle: Sweet Caroline
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
superbadgirl
Category: Horror/Mystery, A/A, H/C, Case Fic
Season/Spoiler: mid to late S1
Rating: R
Word Count: 5,684 this chapter/57,900, all told
Summary: Dean and Sam head to a small Minnesota town to investigate the mysterious death of a college student. They struggle to put together the pieces and end the hunt before anyone else gets hurt or killed.
Author's Notes: It goes without saying that I thankldyanne for the alpha and encouragement, and meg_tdj for the beta. Any remaining mistakes are mine.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Really, not even a car.
Prologue, Chapter One, Chapter Two, Chapter Three, Chapter Four, Chapter Five, Chapter Six
“You guys are all-around lucky. It’s also fortunate I was on patrol out there,” Graham said, continuing on his extended volley of sarcastic comments. “I’ve had another car stationed at the cemetery instead of circling it. We don’t want anything else to happen.”
Dean would give Sam two more minutes, and then he was going to send in a search and rescue team. He’d already maxed out his Deputy Graham time, the other man becoming increasingly annoying with each passing second. It wasn’t just him who thought that. After another last-ditch effort to get him and Sam to check in, Doctor Nuber left them with a restrained scowl at the deputy. Graham kept looking at the exam room door, as if that would make Sam move faster. The guy probably hadn’t ever sustained an injury, working in a rinky-dink town like this. It could be damned difficult doing simple things like dressing, when injured.
Dean was tired. His head hurt. His ribs ached. This really was the case that would not end, but skipping the immediate departure was no longer a choice. It was a necessity. He didn’t think he could drive more than a hundred miles before exhaustion took over, now that he was longer fueled by adrenaline or paranoia. A hundred miles out here in the boonies might as well be a thousand. Especially in the snow. Speaking of, he itched to make sure his car was all right out there in the inclement weather, the thought of her being subjected to such treatment almost as painful to him as the knock on the head.
By the time Sam finally emerged fully clothed and clutching a small plastic bag, Dean was about bouncing off the walls. One look at his brother, though, had him instantly reprioritize. Sam moved with care, and his complexion was waxier than it was before. Gone were the concerns for the car, and the irritation with the Barney Fife wannabe. He stepped toward his brother, not reaching out but close enough to do so if Sam asked him to. He might not be the official brain trust of the family, but he’d clued in to Sam getting bitchier whenever he felt Dean was paying too much attention, not paying enough attention, generally saying the wrong thing…okay, bad examples. The point was he didn’t want to make Sam think he thought he couldn’t walk on his own. That, and Dean had severe doubts he’d be that much help anyway.
“You ready?” Dean asked.
“Help me with the sling?”
“Sure.”
Dean had practice figuring out slings, some of which were like straitjackets. It didn’t take him long to get Sam situated, hating the little exhalations of hurt his brother gave. One of the many, many problems with small towns was the lack of 24-hour pharmacies. Even the onsite medical center pharmacy was closed. Dean would have liked to stop to get Sam something for the pain. The drugs the ER staff had administered would only last so long. Graham left them at the door to pull the police cruiser around. Dean glanced over at his brother as they waited. In truth the more they walked, the less hunched over Sam became.
“I’m fine, Dean,” Sam said without looking or any vocal question from Dean. “How’s your head?”
That was fair, but there was the sour face.
“It’s good.”
Sam snorted.
The more time he and Sam spent together again, the more Dean started looking back and realizing Sam had always been at his bitchiest when Dean was trying the hardest to protect him, or showing concern. He didn’t understand how wanting to make everything okay was such a bad thing. He never would. That was all he and Dad wanted for Sam, but it seemed like that was the one thing Sam constantly threw back at them. Dean didn’t know if that disconnect could ever be repaired. Sometimes knowing wasn’t half the battle. The mystery of Sam might end up having a frustrating, ambiguous ending. Dean found that as long as his little brother was alive and in one piece, he’d take ambiguous here and there.
Deputy Graham parked the car in front of the emergency room door. Given a choice, Dean would walk to the Impala rather than voluntarily ride in a cop car. It couldn’t be that far away, but there was no way he was going to let Sam make a trip in the snow. The chances of slipping were too great, and Dean knew the agony of sudden movement against a recent injury as well as anyone. Better than anyone. Plus, Sam didn’t have a jacket anymore.
Graham seemed to have cooled on the sarcastic comments, and they rode in silence. As they approached the car, Dean almost told the guy to forget it and take them to the motel instead. Fewer in and outs between vehicles would be better for Sam. Once again, though, they were rendered choiceless. The dashboard radio burst into life. Graham picked up the handset.
“1611,” the dispatcher said.
“1611,” Graham repeated.
“We’ve got a 415 at the corner of Nevada and West 7th. 745 Nevada. Possible 594. Someone’s turning lights on and off and things are going bump in the night over there. Lots of loud noise.”
“Copy that. I’m on my way,” Graham ended the brief conversation, giving Dean a sidelong look. “Busy night. You guys mind if I make this quick stop?”
Dean pivoted around to check with Sam. His brother had slouched down, resting his head on the back of the seat. He appeared oblivious. A few minutes being sidetracked wouldn’t be so bad. He nodded. It might be interesting to see what qualified as a disturbance of the peace in a place like this. Some college kid was probably playing music too loudly. Whatever it was, Graham could handle it while he and Sam took naps.
When they pulled up to the house, Dean peered up at it. There was no loud music that he could hear. The house looked quiet.
“1611,” the dispatcher called again, as Graham opened his door.
“1611.”
“That’s a 10-22. Situation resolved itself.”
“I see that, thanks,” Graham said, turning to look at Dean. “I guess not. Let’s get you guys to your car. Your partner looks wiped.”
Weird. Normally, Dean’s interest might have been piqued by the strange non-call. Tonight, he simply wanted sleep.
“Great,” Dean said.
From the back came a faint snore from Sam. He was envious, and glad. If Sam was able to sleep, that meant the pain really was tolerable. Dean didn’t trust Sam to tell him the complete truth. He was suspicious by nature anyway, but it didn’t help the number of times Sam had withheld pertinent information in some misguided attempt to protec…oh. He glanced back at his brother. They were so screwed up neither one of them could recognize what the other was truly saying sometimes. He added it to his list of things to work on sometime that wasn’t right now.
They were at the Impala inside ten minutes. His poor car was covered in snow. Graham got out first, whistling his admiration.
“That’s your car?”
Ah, crap. The Impala wasn’t exactly a regulation government vehicle. Thankfully, the license plates were covered in wet snow.
“The commissioned vehicle is in the shop,” Dean said, shrugging.
“Huh,” Graham said suspiciously, brushing the snow off the car with his gloved hands.
Whatever. By mid-morning, Graham’s mistrust wouldn’t matter. He and Sam would be long gone. Dean just needed two hours of sleep. Or three. Stretching, he found that he’d sat in one position long enough to start feeling stiffness in muscles he hadn’t realized were impacted by the fight with Caroline’s spirit. It sucked getting old. He thought sometimes that hunting was like football – a guy was better in his prime at the purely physical stuff, but the seasoned veteran tended to know enough to avoid the purely physical stuff. Right now, he wasn’t ready to be a seasoned player yet, but he wasn’t twenty-two anymore. With a predictable pang Dean thought of his father, the ultimate seasoned veteran, and hoped he was okay for the billionth time.
Opening the rear driver’s side door, Dean leaned down and poked at his brother, “Hey, wake up. We’re here.”
“Unh, we were far enough away for me to fall asleep?” Sam said right away, slurring.
“No, Graham had to take a call so we had a detour. It was a false alarm, a fake noise complaint or something.” Dean tugged at his brother’s good arm. “Let’s go, giant.”
“Shorty.”
“Shut up.”
Clad only in a thin scrub top, Sam started shivering before he was halfway out of the car. Dean saw the gooseflesh prickle on his brother’s arms and wished he could do something about that, but it wasn't practical for him to lend Sam his jacket for a trek of five steps. Like at the medical center, once Sam was up he did okay. It was the transition points that took extra work. He hoped Sam didn’t take it personally, but he was going to sleep in his clothes tonight. Dean drew the line at undressing and dressing Sam. No matter how much Sam thought he was being babied, there were limits. He grabbed the bag with Sam’s cell and wallet in it.
Graham had the car’s windows all cleared. The snow was heavy and wet enough there shouldn’t be any drifting from the roof onto the rear window.
Sam shuffled around to the passenger side, where he stood looking at the door dumbly.
Right, it was locked. And also it would be easier for him to open and shut it for Sam. Dean trudged around, unlocking and opening the door. He tossed the plastic bag inside before Sam started sliding into the passenger seat. As an afterthought, Dean pulled a ratty blanket from the backseat and tossed it on top of his brother. The guy was looking blue around the edges.
“If you guys are good here,” Graham said as Sam eased into the car, “I’ll take off. We’ll want to do some follow-up in the morning, if you’re feeling up to it.”
“Right,” Dean said. “Of course.”
Graham nodded, got behind the wheel of the cruiser and took off.
Dean watched him go for a moment, wondering how in the hell the guy could be so cheerful and annoying in the middle of the night. He’d bet his last pool hustling’s winnings Graham had volunteered for the night shift patrol to keep an eye on the cemetery. Overzealous cops got in the way on supernatural jobs. Graham was lucky he and Sam dealt with the problem before he stuck his nose somewhere it could get cut off.
“Good riddance to you, Barney Fife,” Dean said. “May we never meet again.”
Sam tapped the inside of the window, getting his attention. His brother looked up at him with a tired, what’s the holdup? expression. Sam was right. Dean was just minutes away from a nice, warm, lumpy motel mattress. It sounded too good to resist at the moment. He quickly let himself into the car, starting it. Sam was already half asleep again, and while Dean wanted nothing more than to lean back and rest his aching head while the engine warmed up a bit, he was worried he’d actually fall asleep and they’d end up spending the night in the car. That would be fine in Florida, but in freaking snowy Minnesota, not so much.
He liked to give his baby a good ten minutes in cold weather, but after five he put her in gear and drove them to the motel. He was glad now they hadn’t checked out earlier. Pulling into a parking space, Dean gave Sam a slight shake. His brother moaned and turned his head, but didn’t open his eyes right away.
“Oh, no, you don’t. I am not carrying your heavy ass to the room,” Dean muttered. His headache increased just thinking about that. “Up and at ‘em, Sammy.”
This time Sam came to with a gasp, followed closely by a mewl of discomfort. For a moment, Dean thought they were going to relive the scene from the hospital. Sam only gasped a few times, then settled. It might have been one of Sam’s common nightmares, which had lessened but not gone away. The hair on the back of Dean’s neck bristled, as he thought it would be just their luck for Sam’s weird ESP thing to kick in when they’d earned a few days’ rest.
“You okay?” Dean asked.
“Yeah, it’s nothing,” Sam said too quickly. “It’s just….”
“It’s just what, Sam?”
“You ever have the feeling you’re forgetting something important?”
“Yeah.”
Sam straightened with a groan, contorting to open the door with his left hand, kicking it open with his foot. He clutched the blanket to him.
Okay, they could carry on a conversation while walking. Dean slid out and circled around the car by the time Sam was finally upright. Yet he just knew if he called his brother out on that, he’d get nothing but assurances Sam was fine. Dean sighed.
“What’re you forgetting?” Dean asked.
“Well, if I knew that, I wouldn’t have the feeling I forgot something,” Sam complained.
Twenty more steps, and there would be the room and inside, the glorious bed on which Dean really wanted to be. Unconscious. With a blanket of his own.
“I know that. What I meant was from tonight, or some other time?”
“Oh.” Sam shambled into him a little, unsteady on his feet.
Join the group, Dean thought. He set Sam on proper course again. Actually, they were at the door. He made sure Sam propped himself against the doorframe while he fumbled with the key.
“It seems recent,” Sam said. “Back at the hospital, I felt it too.”
“I hate that.”
“I know, right?” Sam tripped over the doorjamb. “It’s the worst.”
Not really, but that was neither here nor there. The bed was here and there. Dean never thought he’d welcome the musty smell of a rundown motel as much as he did at that moment. All of the night’s adrenaline rushes caught up with him, as if the bed had some serious, actual mojo over him. The second he saw it was the second his concern for Sam’s injury, while still there, nudged down just a notch. The overriding need was for sleep. He’d drop Sam on his bed, er, make sure Sam was comfortable, and then it was time for sleep. He already had his biological clock set to wake him up in two hours. Or three.
“Maybe you’ll remember in the morning?” Dean asked, thinking please, please, please wait until morning.
Sam’s feelings were both annoying and remarkably accurate. If his brother was feeling a feeling about sweet, officially and spiritually dead Caroline, Dean wasn’t sure he wanted to know about it. Ever, but especially not now. With any luck, Sam’s feeling was a side effect of whatever had been given him, and all of this would fade from memory completely. No déjà vu feelings to wake up to.
“I guess.”
Sam looked at him, thoughtful and slightly cross-eyed from fatigue. Though that could be Dean’s blurry vision at play on both counts. Shit, he was tired of this headache. Dean snagged a few Tylenol out of their first aid stash, popping them dry. He took off his jacket, draping it on the overstuffed easy chair tucked in the corner of the room. He heard Sam yawn, ending it with a small squeak of pain.
“I’m pretty sure it’s important though.”
“It always is, Sam,” Dean said. Now he was being as patronizing as stupid Deputy Graham had been, but, really, if this wasn’t relevant at this very second he saw no reason why both he and Sam couldn’t be unconscious already. “It always is.”
Sam gently lay down on his own bed, sighing when his head hit the pillow.
Dean stared at him for a minute, then had half a heart. He took his brother’s shoes off, not difficult because they weren’t laced. Just a tug and then gravity took over.
“Thanks, Dean,” Sam mumbled.
“Go to sleep, Sam,” Dean said with gruff affection, most of the concussion-induced frustration with Sam vanishing.
Dean supposed it made him a pathetic fool for always needing that from Sam, or maybe just a sad bastard for never quite expecting it. Positive reinforcement was rarely his to claim, including simple shows of gratitude. If for no other reason, he was so damned glad to have Sam back he didn’t know what he’d do if his brother ever left again. Sam gave him what their father never could. It was not because he didn’t think his father wasn’t as much a hero as ever, and not because John Winchester was a heartless SOB. Lately, Dean had started to wonder if his father was so broken he didn’t know how to give his son what he needed.
With those unhappy thoughts, Dean fell into his own bed and was asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.
~~!~~
Sam awakened with a gasp, pulling out of sleep with a familiar sense of panic. His lungs felt as if a great weight was pushing down on them, physical effects of a dream he couldn’t quite remember. He was used to waking suddenly from a dream, but this time he didn’t think it had been the recurring image of Jessica pinned to the ceiling. His lungs burned as he tried to gather in oxygen, and rein in the panic. His heart pounded so fast he could almost hear it. He lifted his head, scanning his surroundings quickly. The room was flooded with late-morning light, overly bright from the sun reflecting off fresh snow. At the foot of his bed a figure stood, its features shadowed by backlighting. His uneasiness increased.
“Someone’s at the door,” it said.
It took him a moment to recognize the voice. Dean. Not…that thing from last night. Sam let his head fall back. Pounding came from the other side of the thin motel door, in sync with his heartbeat.
“Then maybe you should answer it.” Sam rolled gingerly to look at the clock on the nightstand. Crap, it was already almost noon. “Why’d you let me sleep so long?”
Dean snorted, as if that was a stupid question.
Sam guessed it was. He felt like he could sleep for another four hours, a rare sensation for him. Most of the time sleep brought too many subconscious things to light for him to ever truly welcome it.
“I didn’t let you do anything, dude, I just woke up.”
“Oh,” Sam said.
That should worry him. He tended to get up before Dean, but that didn’t mean his brother ever slept until midday unless there was something wrong with him. Sam squinted at Dean, his vision blurring grayish and almost fluid like an oil slick. He blinked the illusion away, sitting up. He started stretching his limbs while Dean tugged on his clothes, grabbed the knife from under his pillow and walked to the door. More muscles than Sam knew he had were sore. He was finally in good hunting shape again, but there were certain muscle groups that were always sore after a supernatural skirmish. He took a mental tally on his condition, as he tried to brush the cobwebs of sleep aside.
The wound tract in his right shoulder felt tight, but Sam could tell the mending process was already working to knit skin and flesh back together. Accompanying that was a dull, throbbing ache. Once he got something to numb the pain, he’d feel okay. He already felt better than last night, from what he could remember. Movement was just going to be impeded a little for a couple days, but the sling helped keep the shoulder jostling to a minimum. He glanced over at Dean, who was cautiously eyeing the door. If they were going to have company, Sam would like to put some…oh, he’d slept fully dressed. That was good.
“Yeah?” Dean called, keeping the door closed.
“It’s Deputy Graham,” came the muffled response.
Shooting a dark look at Sam, Dean muttered under his breath and hid the blade away before he opened the door. The deputy tromped in, carrying snow and a blast of cold air with him.
Sam had a vague inkling he and Dean had intended to skip town before getting in deeper with local law enforcement. That was their usual routine. Having Deputy Graham show up at their motel wasn’t a good sign. He supposed that was his fault. His shoulder twinged in agreement; if he hadn’t needed sewing up, they could have been in a different state by now. Sliding to the edge of the bed and then standing up carefully, Sam assessed Graham’s rumpled clothes and bloodshot eyes. He was still in uniform. The guy looked like he hadn’t gotten any sleep.
“Who are you guys, really?” Graham said, his words like gunfire.
Sam started to reply, cut off before he could utter a word.
“I know you’re not FBI, so don’t even try to give me that crap.”
“We…”Sam said.
“No, no. You might think I’m just some small town rube, but I’m not an idiot. Government agents don’t drive around a friggin’ classic muscle car. They sure as hell don’t shack up in the same crappy local motel room when there’s a branch hotel available. There’s no one at the Minneapolis FBI division office that can verify an Agent Morrison or Krieger exists. I want to know what’s going on.” Graham paced, breathing heavily and filled with nervous energy.
Sam experienced slight déjà vu of his conversation with Iris, which seemed about a billion years ago now. They were screwed. He gauged the distance between him and the door, not that he could make a fast getaway if his life depended on it, which in a way it just might. Dean threw him a look, but his brother’s face was so bruised Sam couldn’t tell what he was trying to say.
“There must have been some mix-up in paperwork, Deputy Graham. A simple misunderstanding, that’s all. We did just recently transfer from Detroit,” Dean said. Holding his hands up, Dean approached the guy the way he would a wampus cat, cautious but very ready to either fight or run.
“Bullshit,” Graham shouted. “I knew there was something up when your partner or whoever he is suggested the town just get over it. Two deaths in the same place within a week and the FBI wants to brush it off? Oh, I don’t think so. And then you just happened to be out at the cemetery last night when something else obviously went down?”
Bruise or no bruise, there was no room to misinterpret Dean’s expression at Graham’s last tirade. His brother looked at him for help he didn’t feel capable of giving. His brain was too foggy from sleep and soreness and something else nudging at his mind. Sam shrugged with one shoulder, the motion pulling at his injured right. He winced, unconsciously reaching up to press against it. The pain was increasing the longer he was awake, but still tolerable at a dull throb.
“I want you to tell me who you are, what you’re doing in Morris and what you have to do with people dying.”
It slowly occurred to Sam that there was more to Graham’s confrontation than met the eye. Just part of it was his inability to figure out why it was just Graham and not the whole sheriff’s department, for example. He and Dean had been busted impersonating federal agents. They should be in handcuffs by now, and this conversation wouldn’t be happening in a motel room.
“Why don’t you sit down?” Dean said with deceptive calm.
“Why don’t I…”
“Look, maybe you should tell us how you’ve reached this brilliant deduction of yours. Sit.”
Dean was more forceful, and Sam recognized the distraction technique. If they could get the deputy to talk about something else, get him off the track he was currently on, maybe they’d have time to work around this mess. Sam knew he could use it. His head was spinning just a little. He watched Graham pale as he looked at Dean’s stained clothes and stern expression, before perching on the edge of the TV stand. Sometimes a softer approach worked, but then again sometimes it took a hard edge and brusqueness that only Dean could ever deliver consistently, especially now.
“Sam, you should sit, too. You look like you’re going to keel over.”
Out of the blue he had an image of Gwen standing over him, looming and large. It made him anxious. Closing his eyes, he envisioned Caroline Sellke’s headless statue above him instead of Gwen. The face-shaped translucence where the head used to be looked down at him sadly. He didn’t recall the face bit from before, his brain only now adding that detail. He couldn’t be sure if it had really happened or if it was his imagination. He didn’t usually hallucinate during a gig. Or have flashbacks.
“I…” Sam started to say, but he didn’t know how to finish. Somehow Dean was right next to him with a glass of water and a sample packet of pills the doctor had sent him off with, and it startled him.
“Take a pill, Sam. Don’t argue with me,” Dean said, putting the glass and bottle on the bedside table. He leaned close, speaking in hushed tones. “And don’t go all spacey on me, either. I need your help dealing with this doofus. Okay?”
Sam nodded, sitting. He took the pills gratefully, ignoring the water in favor of taking them dry. Across the room, Graham watched them, angry expression still on his face, but simultaneously, interest. He was probably reassessing based on whatever new information he had. Whatever the motivation, Sam felt like a bug in a jar. He shifted to get more comfortable, trying to ignore the additional strain on his shoulder. The way he caught Dean giving him another sidelong, worried look told him he failed on that count. He shook his head, nodding toward Graham.
“First, I’m going to make some coffee,” Dean announced, clapping his hands together. “Seeing as we just woke up and all.”
“If that’s supposed to make me feel bad, it doesn’t,” Graham snapped, “I was up all night. I haven’t slept in nearly thirty-six hours, actually, so while you’re at it, make enough for me, too.”
The maker was a motel standard two-cupper, and couldn’t make enough crappy coffee for any one of them alone, if the way Sam felt was any indication. Dean said something under his breath, glowering at Graham who glowered right back. Sam still couldn’t figure out why the guy hadn’t hauled them into custody.
“Screw the coffee,” Dean said finally. “It looks like you’re too smart for us. You want the truth?”
“That is what I came here for.”
“Dean, I don’t think…,” Sam said, recognizing the stubborn set to Dean’s jaw.
“Okay, then here it is.” Dean spat out, ignoring Sam. He ran a hand through his disheveled hair. “You’re right; we’re not feds. We brothers. We’re also hunters, but we don’t hunt deer or any other kind of wild game. No, what we hunt is evil. Demons, monsters, things that go bump in the night. You with me?”
Graham nodded dazedly, then shook his head in confusion. Perfectly natural.
“We troll for news stories that might be our kind of gig. Don’t ask us how we can tell something’s not a natural occurrence, we just can. We heard about the first death and it didn’t seem right, a young girl dying like that. We came to Morris to figure out what was going on.” Dean emphasized his words with hand gestures and serious glaring. “Well, it turned out to be a vengeful spirit was bound to a statue. Yes, that smashed statue out in the cemetery. There was no repair crew out there. We did that, because it was what we needed to do to get rid of the spirit before it killed anyone else. Let me know if you need me to repeat that.”
As Dean rattled it all off, Graham’s expression grew more and more dumbfounded. By the time Dean was done, the deputy looked at them as if he and Dean had grown second heads. It wouldn’t have been Sam’s choice to blurt it all out like that, but given the circumstances coming up with another cover story wasn’t possible. He knew what kind of reaction the truth was guaranteed to bring. Judging from Graham’s open-mouthed stare, Sam was right about that. However, it was way too late to spin it into a more readily believable story now.
Sometimes a hard edge and brusqueness needed a sugar coating.
“You see, sometimes when people die violently their spirits are so traumatized they can’t move on,” Sam said, keeping his voice soft to counterbalance Dean’s abrupt delivery. “We think that’s what happened in this case. And those spirits don’t belong here anymore. Sometimes we, me and Dean and others like us, have to give them a little push out of our world.”
If, that was, a little push meant salt, lighter fluid and lots of fire. Or a good swing of a sledgehammer or two. Whatever it took. Sam had a sudden memory of the statue coming at him, headless and one-armed. It had looked like something was there, like the statue itself was more of an exoskeleton than a binding agent. He furrowed his eyebrows.
Graham blinked, and looked contemplative. For a long minute, the room was silent. The deputy twitched a few times, toying with his hand-held radio as if he planned on doing what he should have done to start with – call in backup and haul the Winchesters into custody.
“So, let me get this straight. You were out there putting an evil spirit to rest,” Graham said at last, incredulous but also serious. “What were the girls really doing out there?”
“Getting in the way,” Dean said. “It went south fast. Vengeful spirits don’t tend to like what we do to them.”
“Uh. Why was this the first anyone’s heard of it?”
“Trust us, Deputy, it’s a really long, boring story,” Sam said. “I’m not sure you need or want to hear it.”
Graham looked more confused, but then he started to smile. Not the expected reaction.
“I knew it. I knew there was something weird, like really weird, going on around here,” Graham said. “I wasn’t sure before, but after all the crazy stuff last night, I knew those kids couldn’t have died from natural causes. There really is something out there.”
“Let me guess. You were a big X-Files fan,” Dean said dryly.
“Well, yeah.” Graham shot Dean a wild look, starting to pace again. “But only for the first four or five years. After that it started getting unrealistic.”
Dean mouthed, “Unrealistic?”
“Yeah, you know, about aliens and stuff. I liked it when there were more monster-of-the-week stories, not just alien conspiracies.”
“Oh,” Sam said. Speaking of unrealistic, he felt as if the conversation had just turned as surreal as a Salvador Dali painting. Graham was almost bouncing with excitement, for crying out loud. “Right.”
“I just never thought something like this could happen in real life, you know? I didn’t not believe, but…well, after all the crazy stuff, it all makes sense now.”
Sam had initially thought the deputy’s curiosity would be a problem, but it might actually be an advantage now. He glanced at Dean, who looked at him oddly but then nodded. Graham knew the truth and was apparently more enthused about it than freaked, so he might let them go. Time was still a factor; if Graham had figured them out, the sheriff couldn’t be far behind.
“So you understand for us to do our job, sometimes we have to insert ourselves into local investigations,” Sam said carefully, knowing what a profiler would do with that information. “But now that you know the truth, what’re you going to do?”
“What do you mean?”
“About us, Deputy,” Dean said. “I gotta be honest – if we hadn’t been knocked around last night, we’d already be out of here.”
Getting back to his feet, Sam felt the effects of the pain medication right away. He felt sluggish, dull and heavy. He wasn’t surprised when Dean immediately moved across the room to stand closer to him. Dean’s concern was more welcome than irritating, sometimes. Sam wouldn’t faceplant right there or anything, but he shouldn’t have taken the pills without something in his stomach. As if sharing his thoughts, Dean grabbed a protein bar from their stash of ready-to-eat food and handed it to him.
“The spirit’s gone now?”
“Yes,” Dean said.
“You’re sure?” Graham said, regaining his befuddled expression.
“Yes. I don’t know how to be clearer about that. It was tied to the statue. The statue’s gone, therefore so’s the spirit.”
“But what about…”
Sam’s brain kicked in.
A dark shape above him, face ghostly and sad. Heavy. Heaviness on his legs, his stomach, his chest. Breath squeezing from his lungs. Sudden release, gray haze floating away and shaking all over.
“Sam, hey.”
A rough voice called to him. A gentle shake on the shoulder brought pain, and awareness.
“Sam, I told you not to get all spacey on me.”
Sam opened his eyes, finding himself sitting on the bed again. Dean was crouched right in front of him, a hand firmly on his good shoulder. Graham was behind Dean, white and with a fearful expression.
“Dean,” Sam said with a gasping breath, as if he’d really just been suffocating again. “I think we have a problem.”
to Chapter Eight
Author:
superbadgirlCategory: Horror/Mystery, A/A, H/C, Case Fic
Season/Spoiler: mid to late S1
Rating: R
Word Count: 5,684 this chapter/57,900, all told
Summary: Dean and Sam head to a small Minnesota town to investigate the mysterious death of a college student. They struggle to put together the pieces and end the hunt before anyone else gets hurt or killed.
Author's Notes: It goes without saying that I thank
ldyanne for the alpha and encouragement, and meg_tdj for the beta. Any remaining mistakes are mine. Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Really, not even a car.
Prologue, Chapter One, Chapter Two, Chapter Three, Chapter Four, Chapter Five, Chapter Six
“You guys are all-around lucky. It’s also fortunate I was on patrol out there,” Graham said, continuing on his extended volley of sarcastic comments. “I’ve had another car stationed at the cemetery instead of circling it. We don’t want anything else to happen.”
Dean would give Sam two more minutes, and then he was going to send in a search and rescue team. He’d already maxed out his Deputy Graham time, the other man becoming increasingly annoying with each passing second. It wasn’t just him who thought that. After another last-ditch effort to get him and Sam to check in, Doctor Nuber left them with a restrained scowl at the deputy. Graham kept looking at the exam room door, as if that would make Sam move faster. The guy probably hadn’t ever sustained an injury, working in a rinky-dink town like this. It could be damned difficult doing simple things like dressing, when injured.
Dean was tired. His head hurt. His ribs ached. This really was the case that would not end, but skipping the immediate departure was no longer a choice. It was a necessity. He didn’t think he could drive more than a hundred miles before exhaustion took over, now that he was longer fueled by adrenaline or paranoia. A hundred miles out here in the boonies might as well be a thousand. Especially in the snow. Speaking of, he itched to make sure his car was all right out there in the inclement weather, the thought of her being subjected to such treatment almost as painful to him as the knock on the head.
By the time Sam finally emerged fully clothed and clutching a small plastic bag, Dean was about bouncing off the walls. One look at his brother, though, had him instantly reprioritize. Sam moved with care, and his complexion was waxier than it was before. Gone were the concerns for the car, and the irritation with the Barney Fife wannabe. He stepped toward his brother, not reaching out but close enough to do so if Sam asked him to. He might not be the official brain trust of the family, but he’d clued in to Sam getting bitchier whenever he felt Dean was paying too much attention, not paying enough attention, generally saying the wrong thing…okay, bad examples. The point was he didn’t want to make Sam think he thought he couldn’t walk on his own. That, and Dean had severe doubts he’d be that much help anyway.
“You ready?” Dean asked.
“Help me with the sling?”
“Sure.”
Dean had practice figuring out slings, some of which were like straitjackets. It didn’t take him long to get Sam situated, hating the little exhalations of hurt his brother gave. One of the many, many problems with small towns was the lack of 24-hour pharmacies. Even the onsite medical center pharmacy was closed. Dean would have liked to stop to get Sam something for the pain. The drugs the ER staff had administered would only last so long. Graham left them at the door to pull the police cruiser around. Dean glanced over at his brother as they waited. In truth the more they walked, the less hunched over Sam became.
“I’m fine, Dean,” Sam said without looking or any vocal question from Dean. “How’s your head?”
That was fair, but there was the sour face.
“It’s good.”
Sam snorted.
The more time he and Sam spent together again, the more Dean started looking back and realizing Sam had always been at his bitchiest when Dean was trying the hardest to protect him, or showing concern. He didn’t understand how wanting to make everything okay was such a bad thing. He never would. That was all he and Dad wanted for Sam, but it seemed like that was the one thing Sam constantly threw back at them. Dean didn’t know if that disconnect could ever be repaired. Sometimes knowing wasn’t half the battle. The mystery of Sam might end up having a frustrating, ambiguous ending. Dean found that as long as his little brother was alive and in one piece, he’d take ambiguous here and there.
Deputy Graham parked the car in front of the emergency room door. Given a choice, Dean would walk to the Impala rather than voluntarily ride in a cop car. It couldn’t be that far away, but there was no way he was going to let Sam make a trip in the snow. The chances of slipping were too great, and Dean knew the agony of sudden movement against a recent injury as well as anyone. Better than anyone. Plus, Sam didn’t have a jacket anymore.
Graham seemed to have cooled on the sarcastic comments, and they rode in silence. As they approached the car, Dean almost told the guy to forget it and take them to the motel instead. Fewer in and outs between vehicles would be better for Sam. Once again, though, they were rendered choiceless. The dashboard radio burst into life. Graham picked up the handset.
“1611,” the dispatcher said.
“1611,” Graham repeated.
“We’ve got a 415 at the corner of Nevada and West 7th. 745 Nevada. Possible 594. Someone’s turning lights on and off and things are going bump in the night over there. Lots of loud noise.”
“Copy that. I’m on my way,” Graham ended the brief conversation, giving Dean a sidelong look. “Busy night. You guys mind if I make this quick stop?”
Dean pivoted around to check with Sam. His brother had slouched down, resting his head on the back of the seat. He appeared oblivious. A few minutes being sidetracked wouldn’t be so bad. He nodded. It might be interesting to see what qualified as a disturbance of the peace in a place like this. Some college kid was probably playing music too loudly. Whatever it was, Graham could handle it while he and Sam took naps.
When they pulled up to the house, Dean peered up at it. There was no loud music that he could hear. The house looked quiet.
“1611,” the dispatcher called again, as Graham opened his door.
“1611.”
“That’s a 10-22. Situation resolved itself.”
“I see that, thanks,” Graham said, turning to look at Dean. “I guess not. Let’s get you guys to your car. Your partner looks wiped.”
Weird. Normally, Dean’s interest might have been piqued by the strange non-call. Tonight, he simply wanted sleep.
“Great,” Dean said.
From the back came a faint snore from Sam. He was envious, and glad. If Sam was able to sleep, that meant the pain really was tolerable. Dean didn’t trust Sam to tell him the complete truth. He was suspicious by nature anyway, but it didn’t help the number of times Sam had withheld pertinent information in some misguided attempt to protec…oh. He glanced back at his brother. They were so screwed up neither one of them could recognize what the other was truly saying sometimes. He added it to his list of things to work on sometime that wasn’t right now.
They were at the Impala inside ten minutes. His poor car was covered in snow. Graham got out first, whistling his admiration.
“That’s your car?”
Ah, crap. The Impala wasn’t exactly a regulation government vehicle. Thankfully, the license plates were covered in wet snow.
“The commissioned vehicle is in the shop,” Dean said, shrugging.
“Huh,” Graham said suspiciously, brushing the snow off the car with his gloved hands.
Whatever. By mid-morning, Graham’s mistrust wouldn’t matter. He and Sam would be long gone. Dean just needed two hours of sleep. Or three. Stretching, he found that he’d sat in one position long enough to start feeling stiffness in muscles he hadn’t realized were impacted by the fight with Caroline’s spirit. It sucked getting old. He thought sometimes that hunting was like football – a guy was better in his prime at the purely physical stuff, but the seasoned veteran tended to know enough to avoid the purely physical stuff. Right now, he wasn’t ready to be a seasoned player yet, but he wasn’t twenty-two anymore. With a predictable pang Dean thought of his father, the ultimate seasoned veteran, and hoped he was okay for the billionth time.
Opening the rear driver’s side door, Dean leaned down and poked at his brother, “Hey, wake up. We’re here.”
“Unh, we were far enough away for me to fall asleep?” Sam said right away, slurring.
“No, Graham had to take a call so we had a detour. It was a false alarm, a fake noise complaint or something.” Dean tugged at his brother’s good arm. “Let’s go, giant.”
“Shorty.”
“Shut up.”
Clad only in a thin scrub top, Sam started shivering before he was halfway out of the car. Dean saw the gooseflesh prickle on his brother’s arms and wished he could do something about that, but it wasn't practical for him to lend Sam his jacket for a trek of five steps. Like at the medical center, once Sam was up he did okay. It was the transition points that took extra work. He hoped Sam didn’t take it personally, but he was going to sleep in his clothes tonight. Dean drew the line at undressing and dressing Sam. No matter how much Sam thought he was being babied, there were limits. He grabbed the bag with Sam’s cell and wallet in it.
Graham had the car’s windows all cleared. The snow was heavy and wet enough there shouldn’t be any drifting from the roof onto the rear window.
Sam shuffled around to the passenger side, where he stood looking at the door dumbly.
Right, it was locked. And also it would be easier for him to open and shut it for Sam. Dean trudged around, unlocking and opening the door. He tossed the plastic bag inside before Sam started sliding into the passenger seat. As an afterthought, Dean pulled a ratty blanket from the backseat and tossed it on top of his brother. The guy was looking blue around the edges.
“If you guys are good here,” Graham said as Sam eased into the car, “I’ll take off. We’ll want to do some follow-up in the morning, if you’re feeling up to it.”
“Right,” Dean said. “Of course.”
Graham nodded, got behind the wheel of the cruiser and took off.
Dean watched him go for a moment, wondering how in the hell the guy could be so cheerful and annoying in the middle of the night. He’d bet his last pool hustling’s winnings Graham had volunteered for the night shift patrol to keep an eye on the cemetery. Overzealous cops got in the way on supernatural jobs. Graham was lucky he and Sam dealt with the problem before he stuck his nose somewhere it could get cut off.
“Good riddance to you, Barney Fife,” Dean said. “May we never meet again.”
Sam tapped the inside of the window, getting his attention. His brother looked up at him with a tired, what’s the holdup? expression. Sam was right. Dean was just minutes away from a nice, warm, lumpy motel mattress. It sounded too good to resist at the moment. He quickly let himself into the car, starting it. Sam was already half asleep again, and while Dean wanted nothing more than to lean back and rest his aching head while the engine warmed up a bit, he was worried he’d actually fall asleep and they’d end up spending the night in the car. That would be fine in Florida, but in freaking snowy Minnesota, not so much.
He liked to give his baby a good ten minutes in cold weather, but after five he put her in gear and drove them to the motel. He was glad now they hadn’t checked out earlier. Pulling into a parking space, Dean gave Sam a slight shake. His brother moaned and turned his head, but didn’t open his eyes right away.
“Oh, no, you don’t. I am not carrying your heavy ass to the room,” Dean muttered. His headache increased just thinking about that. “Up and at ‘em, Sammy.”
This time Sam came to with a gasp, followed closely by a mewl of discomfort. For a moment, Dean thought they were going to relive the scene from the hospital. Sam only gasped a few times, then settled. It might have been one of Sam’s common nightmares, which had lessened but not gone away. The hair on the back of Dean’s neck bristled, as he thought it would be just their luck for Sam’s weird ESP thing to kick in when they’d earned a few days’ rest.
“You okay?” Dean asked.
“Yeah, it’s nothing,” Sam said too quickly. “It’s just….”
“It’s just what, Sam?”
“You ever have the feeling you’re forgetting something important?”
“Yeah.”
Sam straightened with a groan, contorting to open the door with his left hand, kicking it open with his foot. He clutched the blanket to him.
Okay, they could carry on a conversation while walking. Dean slid out and circled around the car by the time Sam was finally upright. Yet he just knew if he called his brother out on that, he’d get nothing but assurances Sam was fine. Dean sighed.
“What’re you forgetting?” Dean asked.
“Well, if I knew that, I wouldn’t have the feeling I forgot something,” Sam complained.
Twenty more steps, and there would be the room and inside, the glorious bed on which Dean really wanted to be. Unconscious. With a blanket of his own.
“I know that. What I meant was from tonight, or some other time?”
“Oh.” Sam shambled into him a little, unsteady on his feet.
Join the group, Dean thought. He set Sam on proper course again. Actually, they were at the door. He made sure Sam propped himself against the doorframe while he fumbled with the key.
“It seems recent,” Sam said. “Back at the hospital, I felt it too.”
“I hate that.”
“I know, right?” Sam tripped over the doorjamb. “It’s the worst.”
Not really, but that was neither here nor there. The bed was here and there. Dean never thought he’d welcome the musty smell of a rundown motel as much as he did at that moment. All of the night’s adrenaline rushes caught up with him, as if the bed had some serious, actual mojo over him. The second he saw it was the second his concern for Sam’s injury, while still there, nudged down just a notch. The overriding need was for sleep. He’d drop Sam on his bed, er, make sure Sam was comfortable, and then it was time for sleep. He already had his biological clock set to wake him up in two hours. Or three.
“Maybe you’ll remember in the morning?” Dean asked, thinking please, please, please wait until morning.
Sam’s feelings were both annoying and remarkably accurate. If his brother was feeling a feeling about sweet, officially and spiritually dead Caroline, Dean wasn’t sure he wanted to know about it. Ever, but especially not now. With any luck, Sam’s feeling was a side effect of whatever had been given him, and all of this would fade from memory completely. No déjà vu feelings to wake up to.
“I guess.”
Sam looked at him, thoughtful and slightly cross-eyed from fatigue. Though that could be Dean’s blurry vision at play on both counts. Shit, he was tired of this headache. Dean snagged a few Tylenol out of their first aid stash, popping them dry. He took off his jacket, draping it on the overstuffed easy chair tucked in the corner of the room. He heard Sam yawn, ending it with a small squeak of pain.
“I’m pretty sure it’s important though.”
“It always is, Sam,” Dean said. Now he was being as patronizing as stupid Deputy Graham had been, but, really, if this wasn’t relevant at this very second he saw no reason why both he and Sam couldn’t be unconscious already. “It always is.”
Sam gently lay down on his own bed, sighing when his head hit the pillow.
Dean stared at him for a minute, then had half a heart. He took his brother’s shoes off, not difficult because they weren’t laced. Just a tug and then gravity took over.
“Thanks, Dean,” Sam mumbled.
“Go to sleep, Sam,” Dean said with gruff affection, most of the concussion-induced frustration with Sam vanishing.
Dean supposed it made him a pathetic fool for always needing that from Sam, or maybe just a sad bastard for never quite expecting it. Positive reinforcement was rarely his to claim, including simple shows of gratitude. If for no other reason, he was so damned glad to have Sam back he didn’t know what he’d do if his brother ever left again. Sam gave him what their father never could. It was not because he didn’t think his father wasn’t as much a hero as ever, and not because John Winchester was a heartless SOB. Lately, Dean had started to wonder if his father was so broken he didn’t know how to give his son what he needed.
With those unhappy thoughts, Dean fell into his own bed and was asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.
~~!~~
Sam awakened with a gasp, pulling out of sleep with a familiar sense of panic. His lungs felt as if a great weight was pushing down on them, physical effects of a dream he couldn’t quite remember. He was used to waking suddenly from a dream, but this time he didn’t think it had been the recurring image of Jessica pinned to the ceiling. His lungs burned as he tried to gather in oxygen, and rein in the panic. His heart pounded so fast he could almost hear it. He lifted his head, scanning his surroundings quickly. The room was flooded with late-morning light, overly bright from the sun reflecting off fresh snow. At the foot of his bed a figure stood, its features shadowed by backlighting. His uneasiness increased.
“Someone’s at the door,” it said.
It took him a moment to recognize the voice. Dean. Not…that thing from last night. Sam let his head fall back. Pounding came from the other side of the thin motel door, in sync with his heartbeat.
“Then maybe you should answer it.” Sam rolled gingerly to look at the clock on the nightstand. Crap, it was already almost noon. “Why’d you let me sleep so long?”
Dean snorted, as if that was a stupid question.
Sam guessed it was. He felt like he could sleep for another four hours, a rare sensation for him. Most of the time sleep brought too many subconscious things to light for him to ever truly welcome it.
“I didn’t let you do anything, dude, I just woke up.”
“Oh,” Sam said.
That should worry him. He tended to get up before Dean, but that didn’t mean his brother ever slept until midday unless there was something wrong with him. Sam squinted at Dean, his vision blurring grayish and almost fluid like an oil slick. He blinked the illusion away, sitting up. He started stretching his limbs while Dean tugged on his clothes, grabbed the knife from under his pillow and walked to the door. More muscles than Sam knew he had were sore. He was finally in good hunting shape again, but there were certain muscle groups that were always sore after a supernatural skirmish. He took a mental tally on his condition, as he tried to brush the cobwebs of sleep aside.
The wound tract in his right shoulder felt tight, but Sam could tell the mending process was already working to knit skin and flesh back together. Accompanying that was a dull, throbbing ache. Once he got something to numb the pain, he’d feel okay. He already felt better than last night, from what he could remember. Movement was just going to be impeded a little for a couple days, but the sling helped keep the shoulder jostling to a minimum. He glanced over at Dean, who was cautiously eyeing the door. If they were going to have company, Sam would like to put some…oh, he’d slept fully dressed. That was good.
“Yeah?” Dean called, keeping the door closed.
“It’s Deputy Graham,” came the muffled response.
Shooting a dark look at Sam, Dean muttered under his breath and hid the blade away before he opened the door. The deputy tromped in, carrying snow and a blast of cold air with him.
Sam had a vague inkling he and Dean had intended to skip town before getting in deeper with local law enforcement. That was their usual routine. Having Deputy Graham show up at their motel wasn’t a good sign. He supposed that was his fault. His shoulder twinged in agreement; if he hadn’t needed sewing up, they could have been in a different state by now. Sliding to the edge of the bed and then standing up carefully, Sam assessed Graham’s rumpled clothes and bloodshot eyes. He was still in uniform. The guy looked like he hadn’t gotten any sleep.
“Who are you guys, really?” Graham said, his words like gunfire.
Sam started to reply, cut off before he could utter a word.
“I know you’re not FBI, so don’t even try to give me that crap.”
“We…”Sam said.
“No, no. You might think I’m just some small town rube, but I’m not an idiot. Government agents don’t drive around a friggin’ classic muscle car. They sure as hell don’t shack up in the same crappy local motel room when there’s a branch hotel available. There’s no one at the Minneapolis FBI division office that can verify an Agent Morrison or Krieger exists. I want to know what’s going on.” Graham paced, breathing heavily and filled with nervous energy.
Sam experienced slight déjà vu of his conversation with Iris, which seemed about a billion years ago now. They were screwed. He gauged the distance between him and the door, not that he could make a fast getaway if his life depended on it, which in a way it just might. Dean threw him a look, but his brother’s face was so bruised Sam couldn’t tell what he was trying to say.
“There must have been some mix-up in paperwork, Deputy Graham. A simple misunderstanding, that’s all. We did just recently transfer from Detroit,” Dean said. Holding his hands up, Dean approached the guy the way he would a wampus cat, cautious but very ready to either fight or run.
“Bullshit,” Graham shouted. “I knew there was something up when your partner or whoever he is suggested the town just get over it. Two deaths in the same place within a week and the FBI wants to brush it off? Oh, I don’t think so. And then you just happened to be out at the cemetery last night when something else obviously went down?”
Bruise or no bruise, there was no room to misinterpret Dean’s expression at Graham’s last tirade. His brother looked at him for help he didn’t feel capable of giving. His brain was too foggy from sleep and soreness and something else nudging at his mind. Sam shrugged with one shoulder, the motion pulling at his injured right. He winced, unconsciously reaching up to press against it. The pain was increasing the longer he was awake, but still tolerable at a dull throb.
“I want you to tell me who you are, what you’re doing in Morris and what you have to do with people dying.”
It slowly occurred to Sam that there was more to Graham’s confrontation than met the eye. Just part of it was his inability to figure out why it was just Graham and not the whole sheriff’s department, for example. He and Dean had been busted impersonating federal agents. They should be in handcuffs by now, and this conversation wouldn’t be happening in a motel room.
“Why don’t you sit down?” Dean said with deceptive calm.
“Why don’t I…”
“Look, maybe you should tell us how you’ve reached this brilliant deduction of yours. Sit.”
Dean was more forceful, and Sam recognized the distraction technique. If they could get the deputy to talk about something else, get him off the track he was currently on, maybe they’d have time to work around this mess. Sam knew he could use it. His head was spinning just a little. He watched Graham pale as he looked at Dean’s stained clothes and stern expression, before perching on the edge of the TV stand. Sometimes a softer approach worked, but then again sometimes it took a hard edge and brusqueness that only Dean could ever deliver consistently, especially now.
“Sam, you should sit, too. You look like you’re going to keel over.”
Out of the blue he had an image of Gwen standing over him, looming and large. It made him anxious. Closing his eyes, he envisioned Caroline Sellke’s headless statue above him instead of Gwen. The face-shaped translucence where the head used to be looked down at him sadly. He didn’t recall the face bit from before, his brain only now adding that detail. He couldn’t be sure if it had really happened or if it was his imagination. He didn’t usually hallucinate during a gig. Or have flashbacks.
“I…” Sam started to say, but he didn’t know how to finish. Somehow Dean was right next to him with a glass of water and a sample packet of pills the doctor had sent him off with, and it startled him.
“Take a pill, Sam. Don’t argue with me,” Dean said, putting the glass and bottle on the bedside table. He leaned close, speaking in hushed tones. “And don’t go all spacey on me, either. I need your help dealing with this doofus. Okay?”
Sam nodded, sitting. He took the pills gratefully, ignoring the water in favor of taking them dry. Across the room, Graham watched them, angry expression still on his face, but simultaneously, interest. He was probably reassessing based on whatever new information he had. Whatever the motivation, Sam felt like a bug in a jar. He shifted to get more comfortable, trying to ignore the additional strain on his shoulder. The way he caught Dean giving him another sidelong, worried look told him he failed on that count. He shook his head, nodding toward Graham.
“First, I’m going to make some coffee,” Dean announced, clapping his hands together. “Seeing as we just woke up and all.”
“If that’s supposed to make me feel bad, it doesn’t,” Graham snapped, “I was up all night. I haven’t slept in nearly thirty-six hours, actually, so while you’re at it, make enough for me, too.”
The maker was a motel standard two-cupper, and couldn’t make enough crappy coffee for any one of them alone, if the way Sam felt was any indication. Dean said something under his breath, glowering at Graham who glowered right back. Sam still couldn’t figure out why the guy hadn’t hauled them into custody.
“Screw the coffee,” Dean said finally. “It looks like you’re too smart for us. You want the truth?”
“That is what I came here for.”
“Dean, I don’t think…,” Sam said, recognizing the stubborn set to Dean’s jaw.
“Okay, then here it is.” Dean spat out, ignoring Sam. He ran a hand through his disheveled hair. “You’re right; we’re not feds. We brothers. We’re also hunters, but we don’t hunt deer or any other kind of wild game. No, what we hunt is evil. Demons, monsters, things that go bump in the night. You with me?”
Graham nodded dazedly, then shook his head in confusion. Perfectly natural.
“We troll for news stories that might be our kind of gig. Don’t ask us how we can tell something’s not a natural occurrence, we just can. We heard about the first death and it didn’t seem right, a young girl dying like that. We came to Morris to figure out what was going on.” Dean emphasized his words with hand gestures and serious glaring. “Well, it turned out to be a vengeful spirit was bound to a statue. Yes, that smashed statue out in the cemetery. There was no repair crew out there. We did that, because it was what we needed to do to get rid of the spirit before it killed anyone else. Let me know if you need me to repeat that.”
As Dean rattled it all off, Graham’s expression grew more and more dumbfounded. By the time Dean was done, the deputy looked at them as if he and Dean had grown second heads. It wouldn’t have been Sam’s choice to blurt it all out like that, but given the circumstances coming up with another cover story wasn’t possible. He knew what kind of reaction the truth was guaranteed to bring. Judging from Graham’s open-mouthed stare, Sam was right about that. However, it was way too late to spin it into a more readily believable story now.
Sometimes a hard edge and brusqueness needed a sugar coating.
“You see, sometimes when people die violently their spirits are so traumatized they can’t move on,” Sam said, keeping his voice soft to counterbalance Dean’s abrupt delivery. “We think that’s what happened in this case. And those spirits don’t belong here anymore. Sometimes we, me and Dean and others like us, have to give them a little push out of our world.”
If, that was, a little push meant salt, lighter fluid and lots of fire. Or a good swing of a sledgehammer or two. Whatever it took. Sam had a sudden memory of the statue coming at him, headless and one-armed. It had looked like something was there, like the statue itself was more of an exoskeleton than a binding agent. He furrowed his eyebrows.
Graham blinked, and looked contemplative. For a long minute, the room was silent. The deputy twitched a few times, toying with his hand-held radio as if he planned on doing what he should have done to start with – call in backup and haul the Winchesters into custody.
“So, let me get this straight. You were out there putting an evil spirit to rest,” Graham said at last, incredulous but also serious. “What were the girls really doing out there?”
“Getting in the way,” Dean said. “It went south fast. Vengeful spirits don’t tend to like what we do to them.”
“Uh. Why was this the first anyone’s heard of it?”
“Trust us, Deputy, it’s a really long, boring story,” Sam said. “I’m not sure you need or want to hear it.”
Graham looked more confused, but then he started to smile. Not the expected reaction.
“I knew it. I knew there was something weird, like really weird, going on around here,” Graham said. “I wasn’t sure before, but after all the crazy stuff last night, I knew those kids couldn’t have died from natural causes. There really is something out there.”
“Let me guess. You were a big X-Files fan,” Dean said dryly.
“Well, yeah.” Graham shot Dean a wild look, starting to pace again. “But only for the first four or five years. After that it started getting unrealistic.”
Dean mouthed, “Unrealistic?”
“Yeah, you know, about aliens and stuff. I liked it when there were more monster-of-the-week stories, not just alien conspiracies.”
“Oh,” Sam said. Speaking of unrealistic, he felt as if the conversation had just turned as surreal as a Salvador Dali painting. Graham was almost bouncing with excitement, for crying out loud. “Right.”
“I just never thought something like this could happen in real life, you know? I didn’t not believe, but…well, after all the crazy stuff, it all makes sense now.”
Sam had initially thought the deputy’s curiosity would be a problem, but it might actually be an advantage now. He glanced at Dean, who looked at him oddly but then nodded. Graham knew the truth and was apparently more enthused about it than freaked, so he might let them go. Time was still a factor; if Graham had figured them out, the sheriff couldn’t be far behind.
“So you understand for us to do our job, sometimes we have to insert ourselves into local investigations,” Sam said carefully, knowing what a profiler would do with that information. “But now that you know the truth, what’re you going to do?”
“What do you mean?”
“About us, Deputy,” Dean said. “I gotta be honest – if we hadn’t been knocked around last night, we’d already be out of here.”
Getting back to his feet, Sam felt the effects of the pain medication right away. He felt sluggish, dull and heavy. He wasn’t surprised when Dean immediately moved across the room to stand closer to him. Dean’s concern was more welcome than irritating, sometimes. Sam wouldn’t faceplant right there or anything, but he shouldn’t have taken the pills without something in his stomach. As if sharing his thoughts, Dean grabbed a protein bar from their stash of ready-to-eat food and handed it to him.
“The spirit’s gone now?”
“Yes,” Dean said.
“You’re sure?” Graham said, regaining his befuddled expression.
“Yes. I don’t know how to be clearer about that. It was tied to the statue. The statue’s gone, therefore so’s the spirit.”
“But what about…”
Sam’s brain kicked in.
A dark shape above him, face ghostly and sad. Heavy. Heaviness on his legs, his stomach, his chest. Breath squeezing from his lungs. Sudden release, gray haze floating away and shaking all over.
“Sam, hey.”
A rough voice called to him. A gentle shake on the shoulder brought pain, and awareness.
“Sam, I told you not to get all spacey on me.”
Sam opened his eyes, finding himself sitting on the bed again. Dean was crouched right in front of him, a hand firmly on his good shoulder. Graham was behind Dean, white and with a fearful expression.
“Dean,” Sam said with a gasping breath, as if he’d really just been suffocating again. “I think we have a problem.”
to Chapter Eight
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Date: 2008-10-05 06:11 pm (UTC)I like how Dean is always insta-protective, even when he's feeling crappy himself, until the wild call of the bed becomes too much for them. But even then he took off Sam's shoes. Awww.
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Date: 2008-10-05 09:23 pm (UTC)