09x09 - Once Upon a Timepiece - Part Two: The MacGuffin
Episode Number: 09x09 of Season 9 Fan Fiction (S9FF)
Title: Once Upon a Timepiece
Subtitle: The MacGuffin
Author: dracox-serdriel
Word Count: 2,007
Rating: R
Warnings: language, violence
Status: Complete. Feedback is appreciated.
"Mrs. Tran, we will," Dean said into his phone. "Don't worry about any of that. Okay? We're on it. And things've stopped. We'll hunt the sons of bitches down and make sure you're okay."
After another few minutes, he said, "Oh, wait, you're - " Then he hung up. "Wow," he commented, tucking his phone back into his jacket pocket.
"What's going on?" Sam asked from behind the wheel.
"We've successfully amped Tran's terror level to red," said Dean, rolling his eyes. "At least the hunter 'tweens seem to be taking it in stride. And seriously."
"That's good."
"Sam, we drove out there like maniacs, and - nothing."
"Not nothing, Dean, something went down there," Sam replied. "We just don't know what."
"We know it's not devil dogs of doom, er, Salties," Dean corrected himself. "They weren't in any danger and we just shook the trees out there."
"You don't know that."
"You find any more signs or omens?" Dean asked.
"Not in New Jersey. I did get some reports of omen-like weather elsewhere but a different pattern."
"So, you found nothing."
"If it stopped, it stopped for a reason," Sam snapped back. "Even if we did gank that one witch in South Carolina, you were the one that said it, there's gotta be at least two more in the other states."
Dean sat back in the passenger seat. "We should've taken my baby."
"I don't think you'll think that once we're there," Sam replied with a smile.
Dean fidgeted in his seat, "What's this case again?"
"Series of local miracles in Louisiana about two hours outside of New Orleans."
"Miracles?" Dean asked.
"People making incredible recoveries at age eighty, rocks being turned into silver, that kind of thing."
"Seriously?"
"Figured we should check it out before it snowballed."
"Snowballed? Into what?"
"No idea," Sam replied. "Reports started over the summer before the tourist season, then just stopped in high-tourist tide, then started up again a few weeks ago."
"You're thinking its something creepy and crawly that hides from tourists?"
Sam laughed. "I think it's like that wishing well we ran into. Good things happen then suddenly, a zombie's eating your brains."
"Zombies?"
"Shut up, you know what I mean."
Dean sulked. Maybe he noticed Sam looking at him a little long, because Dean asked, "What?"
"Did you get a chance to talk to Cas?" Sam asked.
"You mean in the three seconds we got to switch cars?" Dean replied dryly. "No, you dragged me on this stupid case."
Sam felt guilty. He wanted to give Dean and Cas some time to check in, finally make up. They deserved it. But Dodge called him on this case, which meant it was big, and he had to look into it.
He wondered when Dodge's opinion became so important to him. It seemed like only yesterday he thought she'd double-cross him, and now he dropped everything for her.
Dean turned up Styx, distracting Sam from his thoughts.
The Middle Kingdom. The pious man, a bonze, asked the farmer, "You have so much, won't you spare me a single pear from your cart?"
But no matter how he asked, the farmer refused. A bystander purchased a pear from the miser and turned immediately to the bonze, "Sir, here, please, I cannot stand the noise any longer. Your pleadings have caused great commotion."
The bonze broke into a smile as he took the pear. "Thank you kindest sir. One like me, who has given up the world, cannot be miserly. So I tell you all, I have many fine pears that equal to this, and I invite each of you to take and eat."
He took the small pair and put it into the ground in the middle of the market place. And sure enough, up sprang a tree that grew to a grand size and fruit appeared on its branches. No one even looked at the farmer's produce as they plucked the fine fruit and ate freely.
"For from the good heart is the richness that no fruit can yield," said the bonze to the farmer. Then he disappeared.
Grand Isle, Louisiana. Edward woke up. He hated having dreams like that. They were vivid and compelling and felt like being alive, until he woke up in his old bed and remembered his own life, devoid of magic.
Who was the bonze? Because Edward knew that face in his dream. He reached over to his bedside table and picked up his book. Yes, he'd read this story: the Miserly Farmer. He scanned through it again before it occurred hit him.
"Ariq," he whispered.
Edward dressed himself and went to the hospital. On the pretext of signing up for volunteer hours, he hovered around the front desk.
Then he heard it, the telltale sound of Ariq's crutch. He spoke with the head administrative nurse, who seemed less than please.
"You can't turn him away just because he's homeless," Ariq said.
"He's drunk. He should sleep it off!" the nurse said.
"The man has a gaping head wound, which you would see if you took ten seconds to really look at him," he replied. "You send him away, and he'll die."
The head nurse walked away shaking her head.
Edward signed up for two hours next week when Ariq would be helping patients with their insurance and health care forms. If anyone in this town was the bonze from the Miserly Farmer, it would have to be Ariq, but Edward never saw anything magical happen around him. Not yet.
Ariq waved him a fond hello strode by with his awkward crutch.
"Say, Ariq," Edward said. "Where did you get that?"
He smiled. "I don't remember, but I did tell the mayor that I wouldn't trade this in for another crutch or cane until everyone in this town received the same kind of attention I got for this old thing."
"It looks heavy," Edward commented. The thing looked like it was made of metal.
"Not for me," Ariq said as he continued on his way.
Sam sat at the downtown coffee shop waiting for Dean. Some of the reports came from this general area, but they were spread over weeks. There were three reports of people spontaneously healing, two reports of a man disappearing into thin air, and half dozen reports of gravel turning into silver.
"Mr. Ogden," the awkward teen working the patio said to a sickly-looking man leaving the shop. Sam wondered if he was waiting around for magic healing, since the his face was almost blue against his red hair.
"I told you, it's Deshane," he said the teen. "Keep it light, Rommel, see you tomorrow."
Deshane stopped just a few feet from the patio, almost next to Sam, and pulled out an ornate pocket watch for the time.
"Time," he remarked to Sam, "even 'tween strangers, we can agree, there's jus' not enough o' it, huh?"
Dean dropped into his seat at the table. "Okay, so, I've got nothing," he announced.
"Me either."
Their attention suddenly snapped to a man riding, or miming the act of riding, a donkey on a stick. Clearly the toy had been made for a man of his size, which begged the question who would make such a thing for a six-foot tall man?
Once he arrived at the shop, he tossed the toy over his shoulder, and a strap held it in place across his back.
"Uncle Mervin," said Rommel. "Why're you 'ere?"
Mervin replied, "I came to give you this."
He handed Rommel a set of house keys. "You can't leave these at home when I have work. Not if you wanna get back after you clock out," he said. Rommel nodded along in embarrassment.
With that, Mervin walked back to the street, mounted his non-donkey, and mimed his exit.
"What the hell?" Dean said.
"Dean," Sam whispered, indicating someone sitting at another table.
Dean peeked and saw an elderly woman's stooped back slowly straightened out. It looked like ten years peeled away from her.
"It worked!" she whispered to the person sitting with her. "You were right!"
Sam indicated he'd check it out. As the old woman got up and began walking, then later dancing, around the patio, he swooped in to speak to her companion.
"Hi," he began, "I'm Sam."
"I'm Charles, Chuck," he replied. "That's my mom."
"I see that," Sam said. "Look, Chuck, I brought my brother here because I've heard things. He's not doing well, and he's my only family. Please."
Chuck thought on this and said, "You need to talk to Ziegler. I don't know what's going on, but he told me to bring mom here around this time, and - "
His eyes traveled to his mother doing the moonwalk.
"Doctors said she had weeks left, maybe."
"Ziegler?"
"Yeah, Ed Ziegler. He's over on Tristen Street."
"Thank you, thanks," Sam replied eagerly.
"No," Dean repeated. "Just, no."
"We need to figure out what's doing this before people start mutating into psycho killers or frogs," Sam said.
"Frogs?" Dean asked sarcastically. "You must be tired."
"We need to talk to this Ziegler guy."
"Fine, how's this? I'll get my suit and go chat to the local doctors about the mysterious healing," Dean suggested. "You talk to whoever."
"What're you going to tell the doctors again Dean? 'Hi, I'm with the FBI, and I'm here to ask about people getting better.'?"
"No. I could go with, what, insurance fraud scam? Right? Someone says they're sick, magically gets better after lots of expense? Someone's gotta look into it."
Sam's snappy retort didn't make it out of his mouth. "All right, sure. Have fun," he said. "But you're walking."
"Damn," Dean muttered as Sam stepped into his pickup.
Sam parked on a main road and walked onto Tristen Street, which had about six houses on it. A young man crashed into Sam by accident, stepping back with an "Oh!"
"Sorry," Sam said.
"I'm sorry," the young man replied.
"I'm, well, looking for Ed Ziegler," Sam said hopefully.
"Oh, he's there, in the blue house, cher."
Without another word, the young man rounded on the main road and was gone.
Sam approached the blue house and saw ZEIGLER on the mailbox. That was promising. He saw no car in the driveway, but he approached anyway.
He knocked. No answer. He knocked again. Nothing. As calmly as possible, Sam took out his lock picks and unlocked the door.
The inside was unremarkable. Whoever lived here had no books about magic, the occult, or monsters. Sam poured over the living room, dining room, even checked the basement, and found nothing in the way of witchcraft or the supernatural. His EMF reader uncovered nothing.
He went upstairs and found a very short hallway with only three doors: a bathroom and two bedrooms. One looked unoccupied, but Sam searched it anyway.
The second bedroom had an old book on the nightstand. Its leather cover had Chinese symbols on it, but the text was all in English.
He waved the EMF reader over the book, and it lit up like a Christmas tree.
"Bingo," he said to himself as he pocketed it.
"Can you tell me anything else?" Dean asked again.
Doctor Shubert shook her head. "Sorry, no."
"So, your sickest patients are now healthy, and you have no idea how?"
Shubert smiled. "Cher, you can' jus' expec' the en'ire world tah make sense fer you."
"You agree, then, that these are miracles?"
"Why no'?" she replied. "I can' prove tha's wha's been goin' on, bu' I'm mor'in happy to believe i'. These're good people. You understand? I'm no' sorry their doin' be'er, and yeh, I say doin' be'er because before they 'ere dyin', make no mis'ake."
"Right, thanks for your time, then."
Dean walked off and pulled out his phone. "I got nadda. Will you pick me up at the hospital?"
As he made for the door, Dean nearly crashed into Ariq.
"Woah, sorry there," Dean said. "My bad."
"Cher, you're jus' sayin' that because of the crutch."
<<< Previous Part:
Part One: Dues Ex Machina
Next Part: >>>
Part Three: Red Herring
Primary Post: 09x09 Once Upon a Timepiece
Primary Post: Season 9 Fan Fiction (S9FF)
Title: Once Upon a Timepiece
Subtitle: The MacGuffin
Author: dracox-serdriel
Word Count: 2,007
Rating: R
Warnings: language, violence
Status: Complete. Feedback is appreciated.
"Mrs. Tran, we will," Dean said into his phone. "Don't worry about any of that. Okay? We're on it. And things've stopped. We'll hunt the sons of bitches down and make sure you're okay."
After another few minutes, he said, "Oh, wait, you're - " Then he hung up. "Wow," he commented, tucking his phone back into his jacket pocket.
"What's going on?" Sam asked from behind the wheel.
"We've successfully amped Tran's terror level to red," said Dean, rolling his eyes. "At least the hunter 'tweens seem to be taking it in stride. And seriously."
"That's good."
"Sam, we drove out there like maniacs, and - nothing."
"Not nothing, Dean, something went down there," Sam replied. "We just don't know what."
"We know it's not devil dogs of doom, er, Salties," Dean corrected himself. "They weren't in any danger and we just shook the trees out there."
"You don't know that."
"You find any more signs or omens?" Dean asked.
"Not in New Jersey. I did get some reports of omen-like weather elsewhere but a different pattern."
"So, you found nothing."
"If it stopped, it stopped for a reason," Sam snapped back. "Even if we did gank that one witch in South Carolina, you were the one that said it, there's gotta be at least two more in the other states."
Dean sat back in the passenger seat. "We should've taken my baby."
"I don't think you'll think that once we're there," Sam replied with a smile.
Dean fidgeted in his seat, "What's this case again?"
"Series of local miracles in Louisiana about two hours outside of New Orleans."
"Miracles?" Dean asked.
"People making incredible recoveries at age eighty, rocks being turned into silver, that kind of thing."
"Seriously?"
"Figured we should check it out before it snowballed."
"Snowballed? Into what?"
"No idea," Sam replied. "Reports started over the summer before the tourist season, then just stopped in high-tourist tide, then started up again a few weeks ago."
"You're thinking its something creepy and crawly that hides from tourists?"
Sam laughed. "I think it's like that wishing well we ran into. Good things happen then suddenly, a zombie's eating your brains."
"Zombies?"
"Shut up, you know what I mean."
Dean sulked. Maybe he noticed Sam looking at him a little long, because Dean asked, "What?"
"Did you get a chance to talk to Cas?" Sam asked.
"You mean in the three seconds we got to switch cars?" Dean replied dryly. "No, you dragged me on this stupid case."
Sam felt guilty. He wanted to give Dean and Cas some time to check in, finally make up. They deserved it. But Dodge called him on this case, which meant it was big, and he had to look into it.
He wondered when Dodge's opinion became so important to him. It seemed like only yesterday he thought she'd double-cross him, and now he dropped everything for her.
Dean turned up Styx, distracting Sam from his thoughts.
The Middle Kingdom. The pious man, a bonze, asked the farmer, "You have so much, won't you spare me a single pear from your cart?"
But no matter how he asked, the farmer refused. A bystander purchased a pear from the miser and turned immediately to the bonze, "Sir, here, please, I cannot stand the noise any longer. Your pleadings have caused great commotion."
The bonze broke into a smile as he took the pear. "Thank you kindest sir. One like me, who has given up the world, cannot be miserly. So I tell you all, I have many fine pears that equal to this, and I invite each of you to take and eat."
He took the small pair and put it into the ground in the middle of the market place. And sure enough, up sprang a tree that grew to a grand size and fruit appeared on its branches. No one even looked at the farmer's produce as they plucked the fine fruit and ate freely.
"For from the good heart is the richness that no fruit can yield," said the bonze to the farmer. Then he disappeared.
Grand Isle, Louisiana. Edward woke up. He hated having dreams like that. They were vivid and compelling and felt like being alive, until he woke up in his old bed and remembered his own life, devoid of magic.
Who was the bonze? Because Edward knew that face in his dream. He reached over to his bedside table and picked up his book. Yes, he'd read this story: the Miserly Farmer. He scanned through it again before it occurred hit him.
"Ariq," he whispered.
Edward dressed himself and went to the hospital. On the pretext of signing up for volunteer hours, he hovered around the front desk.
Then he heard it, the telltale sound of Ariq's crutch. He spoke with the head administrative nurse, who seemed less than please.
"You can't turn him away just because he's homeless," Ariq said.
"He's drunk. He should sleep it off!" the nurse said.
"The man has a gaping head wound, which you would see if you took ten seconds to really look at him," he replied. "You send him away, and he'll die."
The head nurse walked away shaking her head.
Edward signed up for two hours next week when Ariq would be helping patients with their insurance and health care forms. If anyone in this town was the bonze from the Miserly Farmer, it would have to be Ariq, but Edward never saw anything magical happen around him. Not yet.
Ariq waved him a fond hello strode by with his awkward crutch.
"Say, Ariq," Edward said. "Where did you get that?"
He smiled. "I don't remember, but I did tell the mayor that I wouldn't trade this in for another crutch or cane until everyone in this town received the same kind of attention I got for this old thing."
"It looks heavy," Edward commented. The thing looked like it was made of metal.
"Not for me," Ariq said as he continued on his way.
Sam sat at the downtown coffee shop waiting for Dean. Some of the reports came from this general area, but they were spread over weeks. There were three reports of people spontaneously healing, two reports of a man disappearing into thin air, and half dozen reports of gravel turning into silver.
"Mr. Ogden," the awkward teen working the patio said to a sickly-looking man leaving the shop. Sam wondered if he was waiting around for magic healing, since the his face was almost blue against his red hair.
"I told you, it's Deshane," he said the teen. "Keep it light, Rommel, see you tomorrow."
Deshane stopped just a few feet from the patio, almost next to Sam, and pulled out an ornate pocket watch for the time.
"Time," he remarked to Sam, "even 'tween strangers, we can agree, there's jus' not enough o' it, huh?"
Dean dropped into his seat at the table. "Okay, so, I've got nothing," he announced.
"Me either."
Their attention suddenly snapped to a man riding, or miming the act of riding, a donkey on a stick. Clearly the toy had been made for a man of his size, which begged the question who would make such a thing for a six-foot tall man?
Once he arrived at the shop, he tossed the toy over his shoulder, and a strap held it in place across his back.
"Uncle Mervin," said Rommel. "Why're you 'ere?"
Mervin replied, "I came to give you this."
He handed Rommel a set of house keys. "You can't leave these at home when I have work. Not if you wanna get back after you clock out," he said. Rommel nodded along in embarrassment.
With that, Mervin walked back to the street, mounted his non-donkey, and mimed his exit.
"What the hell?" Dean said.
"Dean," Sam whispered, indicating someone sitting at another table.
Dean peeked and saw an elderly woman's stooped back slowly straightened out. It looked like ten years peeled away from her.
"It worked!" she whispered to the person sitting with her. "You were right!"
Sam indicated he'd check it out. As the old woman got up and began walking, then later dancing, around the patio, he swooped in to speak to her companion.
"Hi," he began, "I'm Sam."
"I'm Charles, Chuck," he replied. "That's my mom."
"I see that," Sam said. "Look, Chuck, I brought my brother here because I've heard things. He's not doing well, and he's my only family. Please."
Chuck thought on this and said, "You need to talk to Ziegler. I don't know what's going on, but he told me to bring mom here around this time, and - "
His eyes traveled to his mother doing the moonwalk.
"Doctors said she had weeks left, maybe."
"Ziegler?"
"Yeah, Ed Ziegler. He's over on Tristen Street."
"Thank you, thanks," Sam replied eagerly.
"No," Dean repeated. "Just, no."
"We need to figure out what's doing this before people start mutating into psycho killers or frogs," Sam said.
"Frogs?" Dean asked sarcastically. "You must be tired."
"We need to talk to this Ziegler guy."
"Fine, how's this? I'll get my suit and go chat to the local doctors about the mysterious healing," Dean suggested. "You talk to whoever."
"What're you going to tell the doctors again Dean? 'Hi, I'm with the FBI, and I'm here to ask about people getting better.'?"
"No. I could go with, what, insurance fraud scam? Right? Someone says they're sick, magically gets better after lots of expense? Someone's gotta look into it."
Sam's snappy retort didn't make it out of his mouth. "All right, sure. Have fun," he said. "But you're walking."
"Damn," Dean muttered as Sam stepped into his pickup.
Sam parked on a main road and walked onto Tristen Street, which had about six houses on it. A young man crashed into Sam by accident, stepping back with an "Oh!"
"Sorry," Sam said.
"I'm sorry," the young man replied.
"I'm, well, looking for Ed Ziegler," Sam said hopefully.
"Oh, he's there, in the blue house, cher."
Without another word, the young man rounded on the main road and was gone.
Sam approached the blue house and saw ZEIGLER on the mailbox. That was promising. He saw no car in the driveway, but he approached anyway.
He knocked. No answer. He knocked again. Nothing. As calmly as possible, Sam took out his lock picks and unlocked the door.
The inside was unremarkable. Whoever lived here had no books about magic, the occult, or monsters. Sam poured over the living room, dining room, even checked the basement, and found nothing in the way of witchcraft or the supernatural. His EMF reader uncovered nothing.
He went upstairs and found a very short hallway with only three doors: a bathroom and two bedrooms. One looked unoccupied, but Sam searched it anyway.
The second bedroom had an old book on the nightstand. Its leather cover had Chinese symbols on it, but the text was all in English.
He waved the EMF reader over the book, and it lit up like a Christmas tree.
"Bingo," he said to himself as he pocketed it.
"Can you tell me anything else?" Dean asked again.
Doctor Shubert shook her head. "Sorry, no."
"So, your sickest patients are now healthy, and you have no idea how?"
Shubert smiled. "Cher, you can' jus' expec' the en'ire world tah make sense fer you."
"You agree, then, that these are miracles?"
"Why no'?" she replied. "I can' prove tha's wha's been goin' on, bu' I'm mor'in happy to believe i'. These're good people. You understand? I'm no' sorry their doin' be'er, and yeh, I say doin' be'er because before they 'ere dyin', make no mis'ake."
"Right, thanks for your time, then."
Dean walked off and pulled out his phone. "I got nadda. Will you pick me up at the hospital?"
As he made for the door, Dean nearly crashed into Ariq.
"Woah, sorry there," Dean said. "My bad."
"Cher, you're jus' sayin' that because of the crutch."
<<< Previous Part:
Part One: Dues Ex Machina
Next Part: >>>
Part Three: Red Herring
Primary Post: 09x09 Once Upon a Timepiece
Primary Post: Season 9 Fan Fiction (S9FF)