SPN Gen Fic: All the Little Children 3/7
Dec. 13th, 2008 03:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
superbadgirlTitle: All the Little Children
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
superbadgirl
Category: Angst,H/C, AU
Season/Spoiler: S3
Rating: R
Word Count: 4,873 this chapter
Summary: Sam's visions didn't die with YED, and they take both him and Dean down paths they'd rather not walk.
Dean paced a tight line in front of him. The motion made Sam sick to his stomach, the same feeling he used to get as a kid as he gazed up at the stars through the rear window while his dad drove corners at breakneck speeds. He didn’t think he could say anything to Dean about being ill without inciting more anger, so he just averted his eyes to the oily stain on the motel room ceiling and willed his stomach into submission. He remained fuzzy on how he’d gotten from Buck’s house to the motel. He remembered only snatches – wordless voices, strong hands, and pain so intense it actually made him feel numb. That numbness should have brought relief, but it didn’t.
There was no respite in a void, just cold and nothingness.
“You cannot seriously be entertaining the idea that I’m going to sit this one out,” Dean said. “After all the shit you gave me about going off half-cocked and reckless a couple of months ago, there’s just no way you can be serious.”
“This is different, Dean,” Sam said. “And it’s different than our usual gigs.”
What he’d seen and felt made it very, very different. There was no real defense against this monster. It was not another day on the job for them. Dean strode harder in his pacing circle at Sam’s words. Sam didn’t know how it was possible, but he swore he could hear the rustling of the short carpet strands with each step his brother took. The swish-swish thundered in his aching head. He closed his eyes, raised a hand to pinch at the bridge of his nose in a futile attempt to stem the pain. He’d been so wrong assessing the Sullivan vision as the worst ever. His head still felt full with odd sensations, an underwater feeling. His brain might as well be sloshing in his skull and trickling out of his ears. The feeling, he supposed, was what the poor woman in his vision had actually endured.
“It’s not different.”
Sam opened his eyes and found Dean had finally stopped moving, standing stock still now and staring at him. He wondered why the swish-swish didn’t stop.
“It’s not, Sam.”
“Dean, she was all alone. There wasn’t anyone in the building doing anything to her. Someone did that from somewhere else. You can’t be anywhere near this.”
“Well, apparently distance doesn’t matter much,” Dean said loudly.
Anger or fear, it didn’t matter the cause, the shouting made Sam want to crawl under a rock. He closed his eyes for a moment, sighing a little.
“Me sitting here with my thumb up my ass while you go out there alone isn’t going to matter. If he wants me, then he can get at me no matter where I am.”
Sam winced. Dean was right about that, of course, but Sam was right in the overall scheme of things. His head ached, and so did his heart. Dean should understand exactly what he was saying. Sam wasn’t ready to let him go yet, wouldn’t ever be ready for that, but he couldn’t be any more of a cause for it than he already was. He could not, could not, watch it happen months before it should, before Sam had any semblance of a grip on Dean dying. So far Dean was safe, but that could change at any minute. Sam knew it could. He closed his eyes.
The strawberry blonde gasped and whimpered in obvious distress, blood trickling from her left ear. Her hazel green eyes were wide, filled with pain and fear. The color of her irises was remarkably like Dean’s. On some level, Sam knew he was just observing, but it seemed as though she was looking right at him. She sat on a metal folding chair, unrestrained by any physical means, in the middle of an old warehouse. It was dark, the only light coming from windows high along the walls. The light was dim, dusky reddish-brown, and did not illuminate much. The warehouse was either in disuse or empty for the night.
“Help me,” she said, her voice wan and shaky. “Please help me.”
Sam’s head began to hurt, as if he were somehow in the vision, or maybe as if it wasn’t a vision at all. This was different. He didn’t usually feel as though he was present in them, but he felt like more than an observer. Maybe…maybe it was real and he could help her. There was sudden pain, a railroad spike in his brain. At the same time he clutched uselessly at his head, blood started leaking from both of the woman’s nostrils and her cries grew louder, more guttural. Sam hunched over. He looked up, making eye contact with the woman. She saw him. She knew he was there. He was flooded with confusion and panic.
“Please, Sam, you have to help me.”
Sam gasped. The pain in his head brought him to his knees, the jolt from the hard floor ricocheting through him. It shouldn’t be possible. She couldn’t know his name. He wasn’t there with her. He reached for the woman anyway. There was so much blood now. All he could see was coated in crimson. Her blood, and his own, too, slick warmth he recognized at his upper lip. Up close, he could taste her terror, pungent like salt and metal. He could feel her pain as his own, electric and sharp. She stared right at him, her face a rictus of horror.
“This will be Dean,” she said, but somehow it was not her. Her body radiated the pain she was in. Her voice, though, was cold calculation. “It can be your brother, in pain like this, at any time. In any place.”
He reeled back, and fell to the floor. The agony was so much it stole his breath away, stole everything. Dean, he thought, was all he could think, Dean and no, no, no.
“Do what I want and I won’t hurt Dean,” the woman said, weakly. “I promise, Sam, I promise we won’t touch Dean if you just do what we want and come alone.”
The woman screamed. Sam screamed along with her, silently though, writhing and pleading and terrified. He couldn’t speak. He wasn’t there, he wasn’t there, it wasn’t real. The woman screamed and screamed and screamed, voice rising in pitch but decreasing in volume until it just ended. It left behind a faint hum, a ringing in his ears for a moment, and then there was nothing at all.
Sam opened his eyes and sat up slowly, but not slowly enough to prevent an unpleasant wave of pain and slight skittering of his sight. The persistent headache from the vision required more than a few Tylenol, which hadn’t even made a dent. He refused to medicate more than that, afraid to be impaired by drugs. They couldn’t afford for him to take the time he needed to recover, so he shoved the discomfort aside. A headache wasn’t a serious affliction, the way a random nosebleed wasn’t either. Sam unconsciously touched his lower lip. His fingers stayed clean.
Dean moved back a step, perching on the edge of the TV stand.
“Dean,” Sam said. “It was like I felt what she felt those last few moments. I can’t even begin to describe it. You don’t understand. Dean, please, I can’t … you can’t….”
Emotion flickered subtly across Dean’s face, a mix of regret and disbelief and so many other things. He thought Dean prided himself on being unreadable and stoic, only Sam had grown up watching his brother, studying him. He knew when Dean lied, when he was in pain and when he was freaked beyond belief. Right now Dean met that last criteria on quite a few levels. Sam had to admit he was right there with him. Dean crossed his arms, expression schooling into careful blankness. Sam knew that for what it was, too.
“Hey, I’m the one who had to scrape you off of the floor, man,” Dean said, bent forward slightly for emphasis. “I might not have felt the pain, but I get how bad this is.”
“Then you understand why I have to do this alone from here on out.”
“No, I understand why you shouldn’t do it alone. You scared the crap of me back there, Sammy.” Dean stood up and paced to the table. He gripped a chair and leaned down a little, like he needed it to brace himself up. “You’re not going to just walk into something blind.”
“Dean, the woman’s brain basically melted in her skull.”
“And I won’t be used as a bartering tool in some evil kid’s game,” Dean said, as if Sam hadn’t said a word. “So if you go, I go. We’re a package deal on this one.”
Dean pulled the chair out and sat down, his stare at Sam as good as a dare.
Sam wanted to pound his fists against the bed in frustrated anger, as he had so many times in his life when faced with his stubborn father and brother. In a few short months he and his brother would no longer be a package deal. Dean seemed to forget that only when it was convenient. Sam understood there were two sets of rules in Dean’s book – the one where Sam was concerned and the one for himself. Hell, Sam had those same rules in reverse. He would do anything for Dean, even if it meant disregarding his own safety. Sam flopped back down on the bed. The oily stain on the ceiling swirled a little.
“You didn’t actually see anything to give us a place to look, but we know the woman is in the warehouse district. That narrows it down enough. You said it was night. Do you think that means it hasn’t happened yet?”
“I’m not sure, Dean,” Sam said tiredly.
“There wasn’t anything in the paper or the news at noon. I think we might still have a shot at saving her.”
Sam couldn’t find it in him to care about the woman as much as he should. Being consciously aware of his own callousness didn’t actually make him feel anything either. The pervasive idea of Dean suffering like that (blood, blood everywhere) because of him was too heavy a burden to allow room for others, or at least that was how he justified it to himself. Was it so horrible that if it meant keeping Dean safe and with him for a while longer, he was willing to let someone else die? Probably. It probably made him a lousy human being. He wasn’t sure he cared all that much about his own soul when Dean’s was at stake.
“How exactly do you think we could do that?” Sam said softly. They could maybe get to her physically, but they couldn’t stop someone from damaging her insides. “I hate to say it, Dean, but even if she’s still alive and we happen to find her, she’s already collateral damage.”
Dean didn’t say anything. Sam couldn’t look at him. He knew what expression his brother had on his face, and he couldn’t bear to see it. Dean’s disapproval and disbelief would make him soften despite himself, and he couldn’t do that when it was Dean’s life on the line. In the otherwise silent room, the plink of water from a leaky bathroom sink faucet resonated loudly.
“I can’t believe you of all people just said that. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try,” Dean said at last. “And if you’re not down with the whole sticking together thing, then I’ll just go find her myself.”
That got Sam’s attention, as Dean probably figured it would. Sam’s mind raced with possible ways of stopping his brother from carrying out the threat. The most appealing idea at that particular moment was knocking Dean unconscious and tying him up. Dean would hate him for that, but Dean would be okay. If Sam felt less shaky, he would exercise that option. No. No, there had to be another way.
“You’re not going to give up, are you?” Sam said, trying to sound resigned. It wasn’t difficult to fake.
“I’ll assume that’s a rhetorical question.”
Sam looked up to where Dean sat quirking a humorless smile. Self-satisfied jerk, Sam thought, I am not letting you do this.
“I managed to narrow it down even more while you were sleeping. There are currently only ten empty warehouses in that district. We can start with those. You feel up for this right now?”
“It doesn’t matter. Time isn’t on that woman’s or our side, Dean,” he said with as much earnest conviction he could muster. He sat up and wobbled on the bed, pressing the heel of his hand to his temple, like he was suffering major vertigo. “Whoa.”
“Maybe you need some more rest first.” Dean frowned at him worriedly.
“Maybe.” Sam smiled weakly and tried to look apologetic. Dean continued to act skittish, for him anyway. Dean’s stomach growled loud enough to be heard across the room. “Maybe you should get something to eat while I lie down for a while longer. We could both use the extra energy.”
Dean narrowed his eyes for a second, and for that second Sam feared his brother doubted him. Which he should, but Sam counted on the fraction of truth in his words to count for something. He eased back down and pretended to get comfortable on the pillow that smelled vaguely of countless other people’s old body oil and bleach. It was true that he wasn’t up for anything strenuous. He knew if Dean went where Sam knew he had to go, then he would be in no position, physically or otherwise, to help when things happened. If he went alone, then he didn’t think he had to worry.
Apparently content with his assessment of Sam, Dean finally relaxed and nodded. “Bring you back anything?”
“I wouldn’t turn down a turkey sandwich with extra pickles,” Sam said. His stomach roiled. “Something that’ll keep for a bit in case I fall asleep.”
“Okay, one turkey sammie for Sammy,” Dean said as he shrugged his jacket on.
Sam groaned and rolled his eyes.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Sam closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of Dean getting ready to leave. They weren’t personal noises, keys jangling, leather rubbing in an almost squeak, but they were important and very much his brother. One day he wouldn’t have the sounds of another life so close. Today might even be the last day for him to just relax and know Dean was right there. The doorknob rattled and Dean was through the door, walking away from him. Sam opened his eyes and waited. He lay motionless for seven minutes, three hundred and eighty-five drips of the bathroom faucet, before he moved.
He knew exactly where to find the woman, had known since the vision. It was just that Dean couldn’t know. Sam thought about writing a note, reconsidered when it just seemed cheesy. Besides, he didn’t know what to say. Dean would never forgive him for meeting with this special kid all by himself, but Sam was okay with that. Dean would live. That was all that mattered. He left the room quickly, and didn’t look back.
*
Sam thought he was pretty clever, and had done so since he was able to talk in near-complete sentences at eighteen months old. As far as book smarts went, intelligence qualified and quantified by academic marks, his little brother was a genius. Sam did, however, tend to fail to appreciate that Dean was no slouch in the brains department himself. He might speak in layman’s terms and wear a blue collar, but Dean was smart where it counted. Although still admittedly worried and freaked to hell about Sam’s collapse, he knew something was up the second Sam capitulated and agreed that together they should find the evil son of a bitch who killed just for the hell of it. Dean was well aware he tended to bully Sam into giving up an argument. This hadn’t been like that.
For one thing, Sam went from no, no, no to okay, sure in a matter of seconds. No matter how compelling Dean’s bully tactics were, they didn’t work instantaneously. For another thing, Dean knew precisely how Sam felt, understood the desperate need to protect. He knew what he’d do if the situations were reversed, which was why Dean had left the room to get food without any real intention of actually getting food. The feeling in his gut had nothing to do with hunger. It told him Sam wasn’t being completely honest with him, and that he needed to keep an eye on his brother. So after parking the car out of sight around the corner, he ducked into a used bookstore across the street from the motel. It took Sam all of ten minutes to exit their room, still looking too pale and shaky. Dean clenched his jaw. At least that part of Sam’s act was genuine, though unhappily so.
“Can I help you find something, sir?” Dean jerked slightly, turning to look at the store clerk, who eyed him with suspicion. “Perhaps you’d like to purchase that book?”
“No, sorry. I’m just browsing,” Dean said. He put the book he’d grabbed – Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul III, he saw with embarrassment – back on the shelf and smiled awkwardly. “I’ll, ah, just be going now.”
“Yes, I think you should,” the clerk said, like Dean was a prime candidate for shoplifting.
Dean scowled and returned his attention to Sam … except Sam wasn’t standing outside the motel anymore. Dean headed for the door, looking frantically through the big plate glass windows, and up and down the street, before he even exited the bookstore. The distraction of the clerk couldn’t have taken more than fifteen seconds, too short a time for Sam to disappear completely. Yet Sam was gone. It wasn’t like Sam was even trying to evade him, which made it all the worse. Dean trotted toward the car. He knew approximately where to look; he’d search warehouse by warehouse until he found what he was looking for. He ignored the obvious flaw in the plan, that the lady in Sam’s vision was a false lead.
It took him hours, long hours filled with painful thoughts about what could be happening with Sam, for him to prowl around the warehouse district. Dean started to think toward the end that it really had been a false lead, that Sam had neglected to tell him the psychic kid had told him exactly where to go, and that it wasn’t anywhere near there. It was like Murphy’s Law gone wrong that it took him nine searches to finally find Sam in the last vacant warehouse on his list.
Sam and the woman, too, who unfortunately was still alive. By unfortunately, he meant for her. It was her sobs and cries of pain that alerted him the second he skulked through the door that he’d finally found the right place. They were unpleasant to hear.
“Please, I’m here like you wanted,” Sam said, voice craggy with emotion. “You can let her go now.”
Dean clenched his jaw, not sure he was really that pleased to hear Sam was affected by the woman’s plight. He didn’t want his brother to be some cold thing, but it was agony for him to hear the anguish in Sam’s voice. When the only reply Sam seemed to get was the woman letting out another weak mewl of pain, he wondered how many times Sam had pleaded for her release, only to indirectly cause her more pain. Dean crouched behind a pile of pallets, staying hidden.
He didn’t know why he didn’t step out into the open. Dean did a visual scan of the big room, searching for signs anyone else was there. He didn’t see anyone, but there were plenty of places to hide, behind packing crates, in the outer lying office spaces. Hell, for all Dean knew, this freak could hide in plain sight. Invisibility was a bit cheesy sci-fi flick for his tastes, but he couldn’t rule it out, not with Andy’s van as evidence to the contrary.
“Please, Sam, you have to help me,” the woman said.
Oh, damn, she and Sam were on a first name basis. Dean clenched his jaw, hating the pain her pleas must be causing his brother.
“Come on, tell me what the hell you want already.” Sam sounded pissed off now. “Why do we have to go through all of this again?”
The woman let out another wrenching cry, and blood started oozing from her nose and ears. Shit. Sam went down on his knees in front of her with a muffled grunt, clutching at whatever he could to keep upright. That was it. Like hell he was just going to sit there while Sam’s vision played out in Technicolor before him. Dean started moving from his hiding place, weapon drawn and ready, but froze when laughter drowned out the woman’s pain and Sam’s gasps. It was cold, unfeeling laughter. It seemed to come from everywhere all at the same time, echoing off walls in a cacophony. Like there was more than one person laughing. Dean clenched his jaw, unhappy at that idea.
“Because it’s kind of fun, Sam.”
One second, it was just Sam and the woman. The next, a floppy-haired kid wearing faded jeans and a dark t-shirt under a loose plaid shirt stood just behind his brother, with a chilling smile on his face. Buck hadn’t been too stoned to get a good look – the kid really was a kid, no more than thirteen. Dean frowned in confusion. That wasn’t possible, it couldn’t be. Azazel, that yellow-eyed bastard, had only shown up again after twenty-two years. Dean started forward again, but he couldn’t move. He tensed his muscles and tried harder, got nowhere. What the hell? He was stuck in place, literally. He opened his mouth to shout out to Sam, when he stated getting a familiar feeling, like his brain being pulled through his nose. Oh, shit. He watched Sam clumsily turn toward the kid.
“What … you’re just a kid,” Sam gasped. “Where did you come from?”
“I’ve been around.”
“You’re doing this.” Sam looked confused. The kid raised a hand and gave some sort of signal. A second later, the woman cried out again and Sam buckled at the waist. “Stop. I’m here, like you wanted.”
“You’re right, I don’t have to do any of this,” the kid said as he walked close to Sam. Dean tried harder to break whatever hold was on him; it was useless. “I told you, it’s fun.”
“Please, please,” the woman said.
“Just stop it, okay?” The kid gestured again, and Sam’s face twitched. He groaned and clutched at his head. “How…?”
“Am I doing that? Practice, Sam. People like us, well, it turns out we don’t have a get-out-of-jail-free card after all. Or maybe my generation was just built better than yours.” The kid shrugged.
Damn it if he didn’t sound like ol’ yellow-eyes. But, generation? Dean didn’t like the implications of that.
“We don’t want to hurt you, Sam, but you broke the rules.”
Sam let out a horrible cry and fell, bracing himself with one hand while the other held his head. The woman screamed, a nonstop wail now, ever weakening until she stopped completely. Dean knew she was dead and not just unconscious. Her head was turned in his direction, eyes staring sightlessly. Sam was left heaving and gasping for breath. Dean watched helplessly, his own head starting to hurt worse. A dull throb set up right behind his eyes. After a minute or two, Sam straightened. Blood streamed from his nose. He gave a sad headshake toward the dead woman, closing his eyes for a second.
“I didn’t break the rules.” Sam’s shoulders slumped. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“One, I didn’t actually do it.” The kid tilted his head, pondering the corpse almost scientifically. “And two, you’re not a good liar.”
“What?”
“We told you to come alone, Sam. You must have thought we were joking.”
Shit.
“I did come alone,” Sam said desperately, but he gave a brief glance exactly where Dean was crouched.
If he could have moved, Dean would have jerked back in surprise. Sam knew he was there, somehow. That scared the crap out of him.
“I came on my own.”
“Maybe you did. Maybe your brother followed you, but you had to know he would. You could have stopped him if you really wanted to. But I guess it doesn’t matter. He’s here and we don’t want him to be, but since he is, it could be interesting.”
Something shook Dean’s right arm, until he released the handgun to the floor with a clatter. It slid away as if propelled, and then … levitated three feet off the ground. In firing position, the gun aimed right at his gut and floated closer. It felt like there were invisible hands all over him, pushing and pulling, making him move. He was a marionette, and there was nothing he could do about it. He’d be used against Sam now. He couldn’t even protest the rough treatment, or let Sam know he was okay. Not that he was okay. Sam clambered to his feet, swayed slightly, and looked about a second from hurling. He wiped a sleeve across the blood trail, smeared and smudged most of it away.
“Dean,” Sam said out loud, a whisper, while the pained, concerned, angry look in his eyes said it all.
He wanted to tell Sam not to let himself be so open, but one look at the smug smile on the kid’s face said that would be worthless advice. So Dean settled on a silent apology, which wasn’t nearly enough. Sam’s expression softened a little, but Dean still saw the lurking fear. The woman’s body slid off the chair like she’d been pushed, landing on the floor with a thump that made Sam wince. Dean tensed every muscle, struggling against the unseen hands guiding him. He failed, of course, and found himself pinned to the chair. The seat was still warm from its previous occupant. The invisible hand feeling went away, but he remained immobile except for his head.
“Dean, you okay?” Sam said, turning so he stood sideways, his attention split between Dean and the nameless kid.
Dean raised his eyebrows, tried to talk and still couldn’t.
Sam frowned at him, pursed his lips and looked at the kid. “I want you to leave him out of this.”
“We were going to, but Dean kind of insisted on it,” the kid said, making yet another indistinct hand gesture. “Didn’t you, Dean?”
The blade Dean had strapped to his calf dislodged itself, hovered in front of him for a second before it flew forward and sliced through his left arm. It wasn’t deep, but Dean cried out, given his voice back at last. Sam lunged for him, halted when the blade re-aimed, midair, in his direction. It was like Max Miller all over again. Dean tried to figure out just how many tricks this kid had up his sleeve. Brain melting, telekinesis, mind control…and he’d apparently been the one that had kept Andy’s van invisible to everyone but him and Sam, given the way he’d just appeared like that. Dean decided he didn’t really want to find out all of the other things the kid could do. It just made him more dangerous. A fucking kid.
“Stop.” Sam made fists of his hands, and took a step toward the kid. Trust Sam to try to negotiate with a crazy person who was already off the deep end. “Stop. You don’t have to do any of this. The yellow-eyed man is dead.”
“Yeah, I know. Your brother killed him, which is more than enough reason to end him right here, right now.” The knife pivoted between Dean and Sam, as if the kid was deciding whom to skewer. “Nah, we discovered we don’t really need Yellow-Eyes anymore.”
“Then why are you doing this?” Sam looked frazzled, about ready to fly into a million pieces. “What do you want?”
“We want you, Sam.”
“F-for what?” Sam said.
“Who’s we?” Dean said at the same time, paused, happy his vocal chords actually worked for something other than crying out in pain. “You keep saying that, but you’re all alone here.”
The kid sneered at him, and snapped his fingers.
Out of nowhere, other kids started appearing. Two right beside him, several along the far wall. All over the place. Each of them wore nearly identical clothes – plaid or striped shirts with rolled up sleeves, and worn jeans. Shaggy hair cut in the same style, when possible. Dean counted ten from his limited vantage point.
Sam did a slow circle, wavering slightly.
Holy shit, Dean thought, holy shit. All of the kids … they looked like, or were trying to look just like Sam.
to chapter four
Author:
superbadgirlCategory: Angst,H/C, AU
Season/Spoiler: S3
Rating: R
Word Count: 4,873 this chapter
Summary: Sam's visions didn't die with YED, and they take both him and Dean down paths they'd rather not walk.
Dean paced a tight line in front of him. The motion made Sam sick to his stomach, the same feeling he used to get as a kid as he gazed up at the stars through the rear window while his dad drove corners at breakneck speeds. He didn’t think he could say anything to Dean about being ill without inciting more anger, so he just averted his eyes to the oily stain on the motel room ceiling and willed his stomach into submission. He remained fuzzy on how he’d gotten from Buck’s house to the motel. He remembered only snatches – wordless voices, strong hands, and pain so intense it actually made him feel numb. That numbness should have brought relief, but it didn’t.
There was no respite in a void, just cold and nothingness.
“You cannot seriously be entertaining the idea that I’m going to sit this one out,” Dean said. “After all the shit you gave me about going off half-cocked and reckless a couple of months ago, there’s just no way you can be serious.”
“This is different, Dean,” Sam said. “And it’s different than our usual gigs.”
What he’d seen and felt made it very, very different. There was no real defense against this monster. It was not another day on the job for them. Dean strode harder in his pacing circle at Sam’s words. Sam didn’t know how it was possible, but he swore he could hear the rustling of the short carpet strands with each step his brother took. The swish-swish thundered in his aching head. He closed his eyes, raised a hand to pinch at the bridge of his nose in a futile attempt to stem the pain. He’d been so wrong assessing the Sullivan vision as the worst ever. His head still felt full with odd sensations, an underwater feeling. His brain might as well be sloshing in his skull and trickling out of his ears. The feeling, he supposed, was what the poor woman in his vision had actually endured.
“It’s not different.”
Sam opened his eyes and found Dean had finally stopped moving, standing stock still now and staring at him. He wondered why the swish-swish didn’t stop.
“It’s not, Sam.”
“Dean, she was all alone. There wasn’t anyone in the building doing anything to her. Someone did that from somewhere else. You can’t be anywhere near this.”
“Well, apparently distance doesn’t matter much,” Dean said loudly.
Anger or fear, it didn’t matter the cause, the shouting made Sam want to crawl under a rock. He closed his eyes for a moment, sighing a little.
“Me sitting here with my thumb up my ass while you go out there alone isn’t going to matter. If he wants me, then he can get at me no matter where I am.”
Sam winced. Dean was right about that, of course, but Sam was right in the overall scheme of things. His head ached, and so did his heart. Dean should understand exactly what he was saying. Sam wasn’t ready to let him go yet, wouldn’t ever be ready for that, but he couldn’t be any more of a cause for it than he already was. He could not, could not, watch it happen months before it should, before Sam had any semblance of a grip on Dean dying. So far Dean was safe, but that could change at any minute. Sam knew it could. He closed his eyes.
The strawberry blonde gasped and whimpered in obvious distress, blood trickling from her left ear. Her hazel green eyes were wide, filled with pain and fear. The color of her irises was remarkably like Dean’s. On some level, Sam knew he was just observing, but it seemed as though she was looking right at him. She sat on a metal folding chair, unrestrained by any physical means, in the middle of an old warehouse. It was dark, the only light coming from windows high along the walls. The light was dim, dusky reddish-brown, and did not illuminate much. The warehouse was either in disuse or empty for the night.
“Help me,” she said, her voice wan and shaky. “Please help me.”
Sam’s head began to hurt, as if he were somehow in the vision, or maybe as if it wasn’t a vision at all. This was different. He didn’t usually feel as though he was present in them, but he felt like more than an observer. Maybe…maybe it was real and he could help her. There was sudden pain, a railroad spike in his brain. At the same time he clutched uselessly at his head, blood started leaking from both of the woman’s nostrils and her cries grew louder, more guttural. Sam hunched over. He looked up, making eye contact with the woman. She saw him. She knew he was there. He was flooded with confusion and panic.
“Please, Sam, you have to help me.”
Sam gasped. The pain in his head brought him to his knees, the jolt from the hard floor ricocheting through him. It shouldn’t be possible. She couldn’t know his name. He wasn’t there with her. He reached for the woman anyway. There was so much blood now. All he could see was coated in crimson. Her blood, and his own, too, slick warmth he recognized at his upper lip. Up close, he could taste her terror, pungent like salt and metal. He could feel her pain as his own, electric and sharp. She stared right at him, her face a rictus of horror.
“This will be Dean,” she said, but somehow it was not her. Her body radiated the pain she was in. Her voice, though, was cold calculation. “It can be your brother, in pain like this, at any time. In any place.”
He reeled back, and fell to the floor. The agony was so much it stole his breath away, stole everything. Dean, he thought, was all he could think, Dean and no, no, no.
“Do what I want and I won’t hurt Dean,” the woman said, weakly. “I promise, Sam, I promise we won’t touch Dean if you just do what we want and come alone.”
The woman screamed. Sam screamed along with her, silently though, writhing and pleading and terrified. He couldn’t speak. He wasn’t there, he wasn’t there, it wasn’t real. The woman screamed and screamed and screamed, voice rising in pitch but decreasing in volume until it just ended. It left behind a faint hum, a ringing in his ears for a moment, and then there was nothing at all.
Sam opened his eyes and sat up slowly, but not slowly enough to prevent an unpleasant wave of pain and slight skittering of his sight. The persistent headache from the vision required more than a few Tylenol, which hadn’t even made a dent. He refused to medicate more than that, afraid to be impaired by drugs. They couldn’t afford for him to take the time he needed to recover, so he shoved the discomfort aside. A headache wasn’t a serious affliction, the way a random nosebleed wasn’t either. Sam unconsciously touched his lower lip. His fingers stayed clean.
Dean moved back a step, perching on the edge of the TV stand.
“Dean,” Sam said. “It was like I felt what she felt those last few moments. I can’t even begin to describe it. You don’t understand. Dean, please, I can’t … you can’t….”
Emotion flickered subtly across Dean’s face, a mix of regret and disbelief and so many other things. He thought Dean prided himself on being unreadable and stoic, only Sam had grown up watching his brother, studying him. He knew when Dean lied, when he was in pain and when he was freaked beyond belief. Right now Dean met that last criteria on quite a few levels. Sam had to admit he was right there with him. Dean crossed his arms, expression schooling into careful blankness. Sam knew that for what it was, too.
“Hey, I’m the one who had to scrape you off of the floor, man,” Dean said, bent forward slightly for emphasis. “I might not have felt the pain, but I get how bad this is.”
“Then you understand why I have to do this alone from here on out.”
“No, I understand why you shouldn’t do it alone. You scared the crap of me back there, Sammy.” Dean stood up and paced to the table. He gripped a chair and leaned down a little, like he needed it to brace himself up. “You’re not going to just walk into something blind.”
“Dean, the woman’s brain basically melted in her skull.”
“And I won’t be used as a bartering tool in some evil kid’s game,” Dean said, as if Sam hadn’t said a word. “So if you go, I go. We’re a package deal on this one.”
Dean pulled the chair out and sat down, his stare at Sam as good as a dare.
Sam wanted to pound his fists against the bed in frustrated anger, as he had so many times in his life when faced with his stubborn father and brother. In a few short months he and his brother would no longer be a package deal. Dean seemed to forget that only when it was convenient. Sam understood there were two sets of rules in Dean’s book – the one where Sam was concerned and the one for himself. Hell, Sam had those same rules in reverse. He would do anything for Dean, even if it meant disregarding his own safety. Sam flopped back down on the bed. The oily stain on the ceiling swirled a little.
“You didn’t actually see anything to give us a place to look, but we know the woman is in the warehouse district. That narrows it down enough. You said it was night. Do you think that means it hasn’t happened yet?”
“I’m not sure, Dean,” Sam said tiredly.
“There wasn’t anything in the paper or the news at noon. I think we might still have a shot at saving her.”
Sam couldn’t find it in him to care about the woman as much as he should. Being consciously aware of his own callousness didn’t actually make him feel anything either. The pervasive idea of Dean suffering like that (blood, blood everywhere) because of him was too heavy a burden to allow room for others, or at least that was how he justified it to himself. Was it so horrible that if it meant keeping Dean safe and with him for a while longer, he was willing to let someone else die? Probably. It probably made him a lousy human being. He wasn’t sure he cared all that much about his own soul when Dean’s was at stake.
“How exactly do you think we could do that?” Sam said softly. They could maybe get to her physically, but they couldn’t stop someone from damaging her insides. “I hate to say it, Dean, but even if she’s still alive and we happen to find her, she’s already collateral damage.”
Dean didn’t say anything. Sam couldn’t look at him. He knew what expression his brother had on his face, and he couldn’t bear to see it. Dean’s disapproval and disbelief would make him soften despite himself, and he couldn’t do that when it was Dean’s life on the line. In the otherwise silent room, the plink of water from a leaky bathroom sink faucet resonated loudly.
“I can’t believe you of all people just said that. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try,” Dean said at last. “And if you’re not down with the whole sticking together thing, then I’ll just go find her myself.”
That got Sam’s attention, as Dean probably figured it would. Sam’s mind raced with possible ways of stopping his brother from carrying out the threat. The most appealing idea at that particular moment was knocking Dean unconscious and tying him up. Dean would hate him for that, but Dean would be okay. If Sam felt less shaky, he would exercise that option. No. No, there had to be another way.
“You’re not going to give up, are you?” Sam said, trying to sound resigned. It wasn’t difficult to fake.
“I’ll assume that’s a rhetorical question.”
Sam looked up to where Dean sat quirking a humorless smile. Self-satisfied jerk, Sam thought, I am not letting you do this.
“I managed to narrow it down even more while you were sleeping. There are currently only ten empty warehouses in that district. We can start with those. You feel up for this right now?”
“It doesn’t matter. Time isn’t on that woman’s or our side, Dean,” he said with as much earnest conviction he could muster. He sat up and wobbled on the bed, pressing the heel of his hand to his temple, like he was suffering major vertigo. “Whoa.”
“Maybe you need some more rest first.” Dean frowned at him worriedly.
“Maybe.” Sam smiled weakly and tried to look apologetic. Dean continued to act skittish, for him anyway. Dean’s stomach growled loud enough to be heard across the room. “Maybe you should get something to eat while I lie down for a while longer. We could both use the extra energy.”
Dean narrowed his eyes for a second, and for that second Sam feared his brother doubted him. Which he should, but Sam counted on the fraction of truth in his words to count for something. He eased back down and pretended to get comfortable on the pillow that smelled vaguely of countless other people’s old body oil and bleach. It was true that he wasn’t up for anything strenuous. He knew if Dean went where Sam knew he had to go, then he would be in no position, physically or otherwise, to help when things happened. If he went alone, then he didn’t think he had to worry.
Apparently content with his assessment of Sam, Dean finally relaxed and nodded. “Bring you back anything?”
“I wouldn’t turn down a turkey sandwich with extra pickles,” Sam said. His stomach roiled. “Something that’ll keep for a bit in case I fall asleep.”
“Okay, one turkey sammie for Sammy,” Dean said as he shrugged his jacket on.
Sam groaned and rolled his eyes.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Sam closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of Dean getting ready to leave. They weren’t personal noises, keys jangling, leather rubbing in an almost squeak, but they were important and very much his brother. One day he wouldn’t have the sounds of another life so close. Today might even be the last day for him to just relax and know Dean was right there. The doorknob rattled and Dean was through the door, walking away from him. Sam opened his eyes and waited. He lay motionless for seven minutes, three hundred and eighty-five drips of the bathroom faucet, before he moved.
He knew exactly where to find the woman, had known since the vision. It was just that Dean couldn’t know. Sam thought about writing a note, reconsidered when it just seemed cheesy. Besides, he didn’t know what to say. Dean would never forgive him for meeting with this special kid all by himself, but Sam was okay with that. Dean would live. That was all that mattered. He left the room quickly, and didn’t look back.
*
Sam thought he was pretty clever, and had done so since he was able to talk in near-complete sentences at eighteen months old. As far as book smarts went, intelligence qualified and quantified by academic marks, his little brother was a genius. Sam did, however, tend to fail to appreciate that Dean was no slouch in the brains department himself. He might speak in layman’s terms and wear a blue collar, but Dean was smart where it counted. Although still admittedly worried and freaked to hell about Sam’s collapse, he knew something was up the second Sam capitulated and agreed that together they should find the evil son of a bitch who killed just for the hell of it. Dean was well aware he tended to bully Sam into giving up an argument. This hadn’t been like that.
For one thing, Sam went from no, no, no to okay, sure in a matter of seconds. No matter how compelling Dean’s bully tactics were, they didn’t work instantaneously. For another thing, Dean knew precisely how Sam felt, understood the desperate need to protect. He knew what he’d do if the situations were reversed, which was why Dean had left the room to get food without any real intention of actually getting food. The feeling in his gut had nothing to do with hunger. It told him Sam wasn’t being completely honest with him, and that he needed to keep an eye on his brother. So after parking the car out of sight around the corner, he ducked into a used bookstore across the street from the motel. It took Sam all of ten minutes to exit their room, still looking too pale and shaky. Dean clenched his jaw. At least that part of Sam’s act was genuine, though unhappily so.
“Can I help you find something, sir?” Dean jerked slightly, turning to look at the store clerk, who eyed him with suspicion. “Perhaps you’d like to purchase that book?”
“No, sorry. I’m just browsing,” Dean said. He put the book he’d grabbed – Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul III, he saw with embarrassment – back on the shelf and smiled awkwardly. “I’ll, ah, just be going now.”
“Yes, I think you should,” the clerk said, like Dean was a prime candidate for shoplifting.
Dean scowled and returned his attention to Sam … except Sam wasn’t standing outside the motel anymore. Dean headed for the door, looking frantically through the big plate glass windows, and up and down the street, before he even exited the bookstore. The distraction of the clerk couldn’t have taken more than fifteen seconds, too short a time for Sam to disappear completely. Yet Sam was gone. It wasn’t like Sam was even trying to evade him, which made it all the worse. Dean trotted toward the car. He knew approximately where to look; he’d search warehouse by warehouse until he found what he was looking for. He ignored the obvious flaw in the plan, that the lady in Sam’s vision was a false lead.
It took him hours, long hours filled with painful thoughts about what could be happening with Sam, for him to prowl around the warehouse district. Dean started to think toward the end that it really had been a false lead, that Sam had neglected to tell him the psychic kid had told him exactly where to go, and that it wasn’t anywhere near there. It was like Murphy’s Law gone wrong that it took him nine searches to finally find Sam in the last vacant warehouse on his list.
Sam and the woman, too, who unfortunately was still alive. By unfortunately, he meant for her. It was her sobs and cries of pain that alerted him the second he skulked through the door that he’d finally found the right place. They were unpleasant to hear.
“Please, I’m here like you wanted,” Sam said, voice craggy with emotion. “You can let her go now.”
Dean clenched his jaw, not sure he was really that pleased to hear Sam was affected by the woman’s plight. He didn’t want his brother to be some cold thing, but it was agony for him to hear the anguish in Sam’s voice. When the only reply Sam seemed to get was the woman letting out another weak mewl of pain, he wondered how many times Sam had pleaded for her release, only to indirectly cause her more pain. Dean crouched behind a pile of pallets, staying hidden.
He didn’t know why he didn’t step out into the open. Dean did a visual scan of the big room, searching for signs anyone else was there. He didn’t see anyone, but there were plenty of places to hide, behind packing crates, in the outer lying office spaces. Hell, for all Dean knew, this freak could hide in plain sight. Invisibility was a bit cheesy sci-fi flick for his tastes, but he couldn’t rule it out, not with Andy’s van as evidence to the contrary.
“Please, Sam, you have to help me,” the woman said.
Oh, damn, she and Sam were on a first name basis. Dean clenched his jaw, hating the pain her pleas must be causing his brother.
“Come on, tell me what the hell you want already.” Sam sounded pissed off now. “Why do we have to go through all of this again?”
The woman let out another wrenching cry, and blood started oozing from her nose and ears. Shit. Sam went down on his knees in front of her with a muffled grunt, clutching at whatever he could to keep upright. That was it. Like hell he was just going to sit there while Sam’s vision played out in Technicolor before him. Dean started moving from his hiding place, weapon drawn and ready, but froze when laughter drowned out the woman’s pain and Sam’s gasps. It was cold, unfeeling laughter. It seemed to come from everywhere all at the same time, echoing off walls in a cacophony. Like there was more than one person laughing. Dean clenched his jaw, unhappy at that idea.
“Because it’s kind of fun, Sam.”
One second, it was just Sam and the woman. The next, a floppy-haired kid wearing faded jeans and a dark t-shirt under a loose plaid shirt stood just behind his brother, with a chilling smile on his face. Buck hadn’t been too stoned to get a good look – the kid really was a kid, no more than thirteen. Dean frowned in confusion. That wasn’t possible, it couldn’t be. Azazel, that yellow-eyed bastard, had only shown up again after twenty-two years. Dean started forward again, but he couldn’t move. He tensed his muscles and tried harder, got nowhere. What the hell? He was stuck in place, literally. He opened his mouth to shout out to Sam, when he stated getting a familiar feeling, like his brain being pulled through his nose. Oh, shit. He watched Sam clumsily turn toward the kid.
“What … you’re just a kid,” Sam gasped. “Where did you come from?”
“I’ve been around.”
“You’re doing this.” Sam looked confused. The kid raised a hand and gave some sort of signal. A second later, the woman cried out again and Sam buckled at the waist. “Stop. I’m here, like you wanted.”
“You’re right, I don’t have to do any of this,” the kid said as he walked close to Sam. Dean tried harder to break whatever hold was on him; it was useless. “I told you, it’s fun.”
“Please, please,” the woman said.
“Just stop it, okay?” The kid gestured again, and Sam’s face twitched. He groaned and clutched at his head. “How…?”
“Am I doing that? Practice, Sam. People like us, well, it turns out we don’t have a get-out-of-jail-free card after all. Or maybe my generation was just built better than yours.” The kid shrugged.
Damn it if he didn’t sound like ol’ yellow-eyes. But, generation? Dean didn’t like the implications of that.
“We don’t want to hurt you, Sam, but you broke the rules.”
Sam let out a horrible cry and fell, bracing himself with one hand while the other held his head. The woman screamed, a nonstop wail now, ever weakening until she stopped completely. Dean knew she was dead and not just unconscious. Her head was turned in his direction, eyes staring sightlessly. Sam was left heaving and gasping for breath. Dean watched helplessly, his own head starting to hurt worse. A dull throb set up right behind his eyes. After a minute or two, Sam straightened. Blood streamed from his nose. He gave a sad headshake toward the dead woman, closing his eyes for a second.
“I didn’t break the rules.” Sam’s shoulders slumped. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“One, I didn’t actually do it.” The kid tilted his head, pondering the corpse almost scientifically. “And two, you’re not a good liar.”
“What?”
“We told you to come alone, Sam. You must have thought we were joking.”
Shit.
“I did come alone,” Sam said desperately, but he gave a brief glance exactly where Dean was crouched.
If he could have moved, Dean would have jerked back in surprise. Sam knew he was there, somehow. That scared the crap out of him.
“I came on my own.”
“Maybe you did. Maybe your brother followed you, but you had to know he would. You could have stopped him if you really wanted to. But I guess it doesn’t matter. He’s here and we don’t want him to be, but since he is, it could be interesting.”
Something shook Dean’s right arm, until he released the handgun to the floor with a clatter. It slid away as if propelled, and then … levitated three feet off the ground. In firing position, the gun aimed right at his gut and floated closer. It felt like there were invisible hands all over him, pushing and pulling, making him move. He was a marionette, and there was nothing he could do about it. He’d be used against Sam now. He couldn’t even protest the rough treatment, or let Sam know he was okay. Not that he was okay. Sam clambered to his feet, swayed slightly, and looked about a second from hurling. He wiped a sleeve across the blood trail, smeared and smudged most of it away.
“Dean,” Sam said out loud, a whisper, while the pained, concerned, angry look in his eyes said it all.
He wanted to tell Sam not to let himself be so open, but one look at the smug smile on the kid’s face said that would be worthless advice. So Dean settled on a silent apology, which wasn’t nearly enough. Sam’s expression softened a little, but Dean still saw the lurking fear. The woman’s body slid off the chair like she’d been pushed, landing on the floor with a thump that made Sam wince. Dean tensed every muscle, struggling against the unseen hands guiding him. He failed, of course, and found himself pinned to the chair. The seat was still warm from its previous occupant. The invisible hand feeling went away, but he remained immobile except for his head.
“Dean, you okay?” Sam said, turning so he stood sideways, his attention split between Dean and the nameless kid.
Dean raised his eyebrows, tried to talk and still couldn’t.
Sam frowned at him, pursed his lips and looked at the kid. “I want you to leave him out of this.”
“We were going to, but Dean kind of insisted on it,” the kid said, making yet another indistinct hand gesture. “Didn’t you, Dean?”
The blade Dean had strapped to his calf dislodged itself, hovered in front of him for a second before it flew forward and sliced through his left arm. It wasn’t deep, but Dean cried out, given his voice back at last. Sam lunged for him, halted when the blade re-aimed, midair, in his direction. It was like Max Miller all over again. Dean tried to figure out just how many tricks this kid had up his sleeve. Brain melting, telekinesis, mind control…and he’d apparently been the one that had kept Andy’s van invisible to everyone but him and Sam, given the way he’d just appeared like that. Dean decided he didn’t really want to find out all of the other things the kid could do. It just made him more dangerous. A fucking kid.
“Stop.” Sam made fists of his hands, and took a step toward the kid. Trust Sam to try to negotiate with a crazy person who was already off the deep end. “Stop. You don’t have to do any of this. The yellow-eyed man is dead.”
“Yeah, I know. Your brother killed him, which is more than enough reason to end him right here, right now.” The knife pivoted between Dean and Sam, as if the kid was deciding whom to skewer. “Nah, we discovered we don’t really need Yellow-Eyes anymore.”
“Then why are you doing this?” Sam looked frazzled, about ready to fly into a million pieces. “What do you want?”
“We want you, Sam.”
“F-for what?” Sam said.
“Who’s we?” Dean said at the same time, paused, happy his vocal chords actually worked for something other than crying out in pain. “You keep saying that, but you’re all alone here.”
The kid sneered at him, and snapped his fingers.
Out of nowhere, other kids started appearing. Two right beside him, several along the far wall. All over the place. Each of them wore nearly identical clothes – plaid or striped shirts with rolled up sleeves, and worn jeans. Shaggy hair cut in the same style, when possible. Dean counted ten from his limited vantage point.
Sam did a slow circle, wavering slightly.
Holy shit, Dean thought, holy shit. All of the kids … they looked like, or were trying to look just like Sam.
to chapter four
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2008-12-14 01:09 am (UTC)Looking forward to the next chapter!
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Date: 2008-12-14 03:15 am (UTC)I was always disappointed with how Kripke set up the YED's kids and then fizzled out with them. Even if they weren't everyone's cuppa, I thought there was a lot of potential there.
I'm a sucker for whumpage, period. ;)
Thanks again!
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Date: 2009-01-22 06:06 am (UTC)This line really stood out to me.
Got to love Dean whumpage...
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Date: 2009-01-22 04:30 pm (UTC)