Down in the Underground Chapter 1
Info: Post 2x03 "Bloodlust" Sam and Dean are called to Oregon when a reputed haunted underground suddenly becomes lethal but things are never quite what they seem. Hurt/limp!Sam and Dean some angst/protective/comfort and brotherly bonding
Author's note: Started this one on a 10 hour bus trip. Did the research for it before I left knowing I was going to finish Busman's Holiday long before I got to NY. Pendleton and its Underground are real and coopted here for Supernatural. All people and places are fictitious except for the town, the Underground and Raphael's Diner. :D
Do please Review once you've read. :D Every comment and vote of support helps keep me writing. Not to mention if I've pooched anything, someone can always tell me. :P
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CHAPTER 1
"Jerry you're such an ass!" Millie Greeling punched her cackling husband in the arm. It was the third time he'd scared her during the ghost tour. Pendleton Underground was supposed to be haunted. So far all they'd seen in the miles of tunnels were cheap costumed mannequins and her husband, the ass, jumping out from behind things like a five year old to make her scream.
"Aw you just got no sense of humor, Millie." Jerry rolled his eyes at her and they followed the rest of the tour group through the dimly lit tunnel into the next set of rooms.
"Now this is the card room." Their tour guide, a bored twenty something waved a hand and leaned against the wall as the group filed in. "This room sits beneath an old Speakeasy. Gamblers would come down here and play Texas Hold 'em through the night." He sounded as though he were half asleep and reading from a cue card. "Games often ended in gunfights with the losers hidden away in the tunnels, never to be found."
"Really, dude. The sound effects are over the top." Jerry said loudly, listening to the shuffling cards, clinking poker chips and the low voices of men rising in argument. The tour guide leaned forward, blue eyes widening beneath the blonde fringe of his hair. The disembodied voices grew louder, angry. The sound of chairs squeaking back over wood floor was followed by running feet. Many of the tourists screeched in fear or clapped as they actually felt the vibrations of the phantom footsteps pass through them.
"Oh my god." The tour guide breathed. Shock was leeching all the color from his face when a half of gunfire sounded. It was loud enough to deafen them all. Some of them screamed. Some of them ran. The tour guide feinted and Millie grunted as her idiot husband chose that moment to fall backwards into her.
"Dammit, Jerry! You ass!" Millie backed up and let him thump into the floor. "Serves you right!" She waited for his cackling laugh. It didn't come. "Knock it off, Jerry. Jerry?" Millie saw a spreading stain on his black t-shirt and his eyes were opened wide and staring. She knelt and put her hand on his chest. Millie turned her palm up to the light. It glistened red beneath the harsh fluorescent light and she screamed as the light suddenly went out. "JERRY!"
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"Dammit, Sammy. Lay still." Dean took a firmer hold of his brother's arm and waited until he settled.
"Sorry." Sam gasped. Only days before, Gordon had laid a long slice in his arm to prove a point with a vampire and failed. The Vampire had stayed reformed, Dean had delivered a well-earned beating and Sam had felt relief that Dean was beginning to see not all monsters were monsters. Now though, he decided Dean hadn't hurt Gordon enough. The cut on his arm was infected and his brother was having to remove the stitches to clean it again.
"I know, Sam." Dean patted his shoulder. "Almost done here." He cursed Gordon again as he cut and pulled the last stitch from the angry red skin; then he cursed his father for leaving him with such a black and white view of the world. More than that for telling him he might have to kill Sam. Sam, who had defended him and a vampire that had actually been worth saving; more proof that his Dad was just dead wrong about his youngest son.
Sam stared up at the dingy ceiling of their motel room as Dean picked up the bottle of antiseptic and nodded at him. He expected the liquid fire that burned into his arm but it didn't make it any easier as black spots danced around his vision. He distantly registered the sound of his voice crying out and then merciful blackness swept him away.
Dean set the bottle aside, quickly palming Sam's face as he went limp. "Damn I'm sorry, kid. This is my fault." He was still kicking himself for trusting the vampires, kind though they were, to properly take care of Sam's wound. He'd been on such uneven ground, trying hard to regain his balance that he'd let himself slip. He threaded a needle and put a quick line of neat sutures back in now it was clean, wrapping it carefully and propped Sam's arm up on a spare pillow.
His phone ringing made Dean curse. He grabbed it off his bed and managed a small smile when he saw Bobby's name. "Hey Bobby." Dean greeted tiredly.
"Dean…you ok?" Bobby couldn't help but hear something off in his voice.
"Yeah, just…that slice Gordon gave Sam. It's infected." Dean rubbed a hand over his face. "I'm dealing with it."
"Balls." Bobby sighed. "I had a job for ya but…I'll find someone else."
"Naw Bobby, we can take it." Dean looked down at Sam and knew he'd agree. "Fever's broke and it should start healing now. What's the job?"
Bobby considered, figuring it would take them a couple days to get there and nodded. "Alright. You're going to Pendleton, Oregon. Whole town is built over miles of tunnels dug out by Chinese immigrant workers back in the day. There's your regular harmless spooks, never hurt nobody."
"I take it that's changed." Dean asked.
"Guy died a couple days ago." Bobby told him. "Shot through the heart with a bullet that wasn't there when they cracked him open."
"Sneaky." Dean smirked. "So, definitely our kind of thing then. I'll fill Sam in when he wakes up." Dean took a good look at the pale, drawn face framed by all that shaggy, dark hair. "We'll get on the road tomorrow."
"You boys be careful and call if ya need help, son." Bobby ordered.
Dean smiled. "We will. Thanks, Bobby." He hung up and sighed. "On the road again tomorrow, little brother." He ran a hand over Sam's forehead for the hundredth time, happy to find it cool finally and shifted over to his own bed. Time he got some damn sleep for a change.
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Sam twisted his left forearm back and forth, feeling the stitches pull and ignored it. The itch that always accompanied a healing cut was becoming maddening.
"Knock it off, Sammy." Dean warned him.
"Sam." He reminded his brother just for forms' sake. He didn't expect Dean to ever stop calling him that but it made him feel better when he was irritated, like now.
Dean snorted. "Stop screwing with your stitches like a twelve year old…Sammy."
"Are we there yet?" Sam deadpanned in reply and grinned when Dean scowled at him.
"You can ride in the trunk, princess." Dean pointed as they neared a large sign. "We're here. Pendleton, Oregon."
It was early afternoon and Sam watched as the outskirts of the town appeared over a small rise, misty blue mountains rose in the distance. The day was overcast and he couldn't escape the sense of foreboding that overcame him.
"Hey, you ok?" Dean's voice was tinged with concern. Sam had gone suddenly pale.
"Yeah." Sam smiled. "Just tired."
Dean nodded. Initially he'd planned on heading straight out to recon the tunnels. Now he kept his eyes open for the first likely motel. Sam obviously needed a little more down time. The Lucky Miner Motel tickled his humor and he pulled in to the office.
"We're stopping?" Sam asked and Dean nodded.
"Room first, then food, then sleep." He got out before Sam could argue that he was 'fine.' He got them a room and stepped out of the office with a happy smile. It turned out in addition to the standard rooms, there were also a few small cabins, empty at the moment thanks to the death and Dean had cheerfully rented one. They were behind the motel proper and nicely isolated even from each other.
"We really should get a good look around the tunnels now." Sam said as they lugged their bags into the cabin.
"Yeah well, we're not til you stop looking like hammered crap." Dean smiled at him. "Dude you look like a ghost." Dean tossed his bag on the couch facing the little tv and surveyed the room. It boasted its own small kitchenette, the couch and an overstuffed chair. An open arched door showed two queen beds covered in threadbare quilts.
"I'm just tired." Sam told him and went back to set his bag on one of the beds. He rubbed a hand between his eyes to forestall a brewing headache and sighed. Dean had a point. "Alright." Sam sat on the bed and leaned back against the padded headboard.
Dean shook his head and pulled the salt canister from his bag. He made quick work of salting the door and the windows. He slapped Sam's knee to wake him from his light doze. "Come on, Rip Van. I need food." Dean grunted as Sam's foot shot out and caught him in the thigh.
"Such a jerk." Sam muttered and got up to follow his snickering brother back out to the car.
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"Eat, Sam." Dean shoved in another mouthful of burger dripping with 'special sauce' and groaned in pleasure.
Sam chuckled. "Should I give you two a moment alone?" He picked at the strips of chicken in his salad and ate one to quiet Dean's mothering streak. In answer, Dean rubbed his middle finger along his nose with a pointed look at his brother.
"Shamin' your mother in public boy." Their waitress, an elderly woman with a beehive of white hair stopped at the table, glaring at Dean until he dropped his hand. Raphael's Diner had tremendous food and a waitress who, for some reason, had decided Dean was an irritant she needed to pick at. Sam was far more amused by the whole thing than his brother.
"Your boss know he hired an old battle axe?" Dean shot back with a saccharine smile. She tossed a pile of napkins into his lap and smiled back.
"Raphael wouldn't like you either. Wipe your face." The waitress actually sneered a little before dropping the check on the table. "That sauce is supposed to go in your mouth."
"Wow." Sam laughed as she left. "We better find somewhere else to eat or she's gonna poison your food."
"Nah." Dean finished his burger, wiped his face and sat back. "She loves me. I can tell."
Sam snorted and pushed the rest of his salad away. "The wife of the dead guy's still in town. She's at the hotel two buildings over. We should go talk to her."
"That all you're gonna eat?" Dean shook his head and stood. "You fall over from malnutrition and I'm personally hooking up a feeding tube."
"I eat enough." Sam muttered, dropping a twenty on the table and followed him outside. Pendleton hadn't changed much since the gold rush days. Main Street was composed of three and four story stone front buildings with nineteenth and early twentieth century architecture in blue, red and green. The electric streetlamps and traffic signs almost looked out of place. The hotel had always been a hotel and still boasted the original, hand carved Hotel sign above its front doors. Inside the current owners had gone for the wild west feel and the whole place looked like something out of an old western.
"Dude. Little Joe and Hoss could walk in here any second." Dean chuckled. He pulled out his FBI badge and flashed it at the stringy haired man behind the counter. "Agent Stokes. My partner Agent Sanders. What room is Mrs…"
"Millie Greeling." Sam supplied, stepping up beside Dean.
"Oh, um… Mrs. Greeling is in room 410." The Manager nodded.
"Thanks." Dean looked around and groaned when Sam pointed to the stairs. "Invest in an elevator, man." Dean groused and followed his brother's long stride.
Despite his complaints, Dean managed to outpace Sam and reached the fourth floor first with a satisfied grin. Dad being gone didn't mean training stopped and that thought sobered his good humor. It was still too close, too painful. He shoved it down deep and strode out into the hall and to room 410. He rapped his knuckles on the door as Sam came up next to him. Dean stepped back quickly and drew his gun as the door swung open an inch.
"Shit. That can't be good." Dean breathed. He saw Sam draw his own and then nudged the door open with his foot. "Mrs. Greeling?"
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