[Fic] She Destroys You Line By Line (3/5)
Master Post | Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five
“Tell me what you got,” Dad asked, well, demanded in the form of a question, when they got outside. Dean frowned, dredging up the last few minutes of conversation which had turned up absolutely nothing new. It was all just speculation and theories, nothing concrete.
“Not much, just the same thing she told me on the phone except she also mentioned that Sam was having nightmares.”
”I didn’t think anything of it.”
She had looked apologetic, but Dean didn’t really see how that could have been something she’d write in her diary about later.
If she knew what was behind what went bump in the night then yeah, maybe she’d pay more attention, but right then it was like trying to remember what kind of shoes someone had been wearing and how they tied the laces when the sky had fallen.
“Did she say what they were about?”
Dean shook his head. “She didn’t think they were anything but stress related.”
Dad looked like he could have made a face as he turned out into the street. Dean could relate, they were literally blind, deaf and dumb here and still they were being asked to try and find a frickin’ needle in a haystack with their hands tied. The space between them filled with silence for a long moment, the kind so thick Dean could probably dig through with a spoon.
“When did they start?”
“The nightmares?”
Dad nodded, turning right back on the road they came on. Surprisingly enough, according to one Jessica Moore, Sam had only lived a few blocks away. Something Dean couldn’t picture for the life of him--Sam, living in a foofy place? No way-really. No way.
Fuck, Sam said he had wanted normal, but that was just way beyond anything remotely resembling it.
“She said he first mentioned them a few months ago.”
“Mentioned,” Dad repeated. “Meaning he could have been having them long before then, too.”
“Yeah.”
This just kept getting weirder and weirder and all of it revolved around Sam.
Why?
What had Sam have done in the last year and a half to possibly rile up something supernatural and insanely psychotic? The kid wasn’t a block of wood, as much as he hated hunting he wasn’t just gonna ignore everything he was taught. The salt lines in Jessica’s apartment that Sam had carefully lain down was enough proof of that. So what the hell could have happened a few months ago to lead up to this?
“Here’s what we’re gonna have to do. I’m going to drop you off at the apartment and I want you to search it, thoroughly-” Dean couldn’t help the slight mental flinch at that. When had he ever not done his job with a fine toothed comb? And when had he ever slacked off whenever it came to Sammy? “-And I’m gonna lift a few stones to see if maybe something happened around the time he started having the bad dreams.”
Dean nodded. Sir, yes sir. Dad glanced over at him before returning the nod.
“Keep a low profile. We have a civilian who can vouch for us, but it doesn’t mean we can afford to bring too much attention to ourselves. You find something suspicious that’ll get the cops called on you then you call me. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
Dad nodded again, good.
No more words were shared for the rest of the drive.
Said rest of the drive happened to turn out to be ten minutes away from Jessica’s place anyway, so it wasn’t dramatic as it sounded. You know, without cheesy music and all that jazz.
Sam’s apartment turned out to be a complex that looked more like a motel than anything else. There were four identical sets that each had two stories which were located directly next to the other with each compact and… box shaped. It was kind of a bizarre Twilight Zone effect, to have the Bronx just five blocks away from Malibu-that just five blocks away from Barbie’s Summer Home was Almost A Hobo Joe’s Box-House.
Though, as much as he hated to think it, this was more like it. This was definitely the kind of place Dean could see Sam being comfortable in, a place that was his that he was probably so damn proud of regardless how shitty it was just cause he had gotten it all on his own.
Dad pulled up to the curb and eyed the place with him, making judgments with the analyzations. Dean got the feeling he already knew what Dad was thinking--it wasn’t good enough--but that reaction was kind of expected. Sam had left them for this, after all.
“You got the room number?” he said when he finally stopped eying the place like a kid at the dentist. Dean nodded.
“13D.”
“You got your phone?”
“Right here.” Dean patted his jacket pocket with one hand.
“Got the supplies?”
“In the trunk.” As usual.
Finally Dad seemed satisfied, having finished giving Dean the run down. “Alright, I’m going to interview his friends and check to see if anything happened in the last couple of months.” Dean could practically hear the stay out of trouble on the tip of his tongue. He got out of the car before Dad could actually think to say it and moved to the back to fish out his junk from the trunk. Dad waited a second longer after Dean slammed the trunk closed, maybe to say something. Give some advice, maybe?
Whatever it was, he changed his mind and the moment was gone just like that--with it Dad’s face closed up like the door slamming shut on a vault. He gave Dean a final nod and pulled back into traffic.
--
Okay, Dean was really beginning to wonder how Sam met a chick like Jessica. It might have been around the fifteenth crack in the cement path that had weeds struggling to push through; something this place seemed to have a lot of.
But the thought kind of bothered him. Jessica was this rich, upper class chick who could probably buy Sam’s apartment and use it to store her shoes (if she had that many shoes) and still go out and buy some awesome yacht with the spare change. Sam, honest to god, probably had been just barely scraping by on his scholarship-counting pennies and using inventive alternatives to save cash. Dean wasn’t stupid enough to say Sam probably hadn’t been making it, because when Sam put his nose to the grindstone he was practically MacGyver, but that didn’t mean he was swimming in it.
So how did the two of them meet? Did Sam run into her? Did Jessica save him from some damsel-y in distress type situation?
Maybe he was thinking too much into it, as much as he hated to say it--not all rich bastards were snobs just like not all poor bastards were humble. Maybe they just met and got along and hit it off so well they decided to hook up. Who knew.
Dean climbed the stairs to the second story walkway, keeping his eyes on the numbers next to the doors as they increased.
12A… B… C… D…
And finally 13. And Sam’s was… D? Dean frowned. There was A, B, and C, but then it went straight to apartment 14A which was missing its gilded lettering. He could only tell what it was only by the outline of dirt of what had been the ‘14A’. What the fuck. Dean backtracked, started again at the start of the row at 10A and went back through until he once again reached the corner at 14A.
Still no 13D, not even on the second time through. Dean wasn’t just missing this thing, it just wasn’t there.
Seriously, what the fuck? Did Sam live in Narnia?
Maybe Sam lived in one of those magical apartments that only appeared when you were ten feet tall, had horns and a canopy for hair. Dean eyed what was the address to 14A again then eyed the other apartments which all still had their lettering. Crappy assed as they were, they were still there, which kind of gave Dean a bit of a clue.
He was going to take a leap of faith here and hope to hell he wasn’t breaking into someone’s home. Dad had told him not to get arrested, after all. Dean sighed, taking out the key Jessica had given him and sticking it in the lock to door 14A.
Surprise, surprise, the stupid thing fit. Which either meant all the locks in this complex were the exact same, Jessica had a skeleton key (which would have been awesome and just vaguely suspicious) or the landlord was a fucking idiot and didn’t replace the lettering with the right address.
It was kind of sad that after all the years of dealing with douche bag landlords that he still hoped it was one of the former. Dean pushed against the door, when it didn’t budge he leaned his weight against it and shoved, nearly falling in when the door unstuck and swung in. It sounded like the building was going to fall down on him, that was so comforting.
Sometimes Dean wished they got hazard pay for this job.
He slipped inside, shutting the door behind him. At the very least, with a shitty door like that, Sam would know if something was coming and have time to… He didn’t know, maybe ready an arsenal while the thing cursed and kicked at the door? Once inside, Dean found himself in a small, slightly cramped hall which he could see eventually ended about five feet away before expanding into what looked like the apartment itself. From where he stood Dean could see a beat up couch and what had to be the disaster zone Jessica had mentioned before.
She wasn’t kidding when she said it looked like a bomb went off.
He stopped just before entering the room and looked around. There was glass everywhere, it was like a goddamn car crash, and by the sorry state the windows were in Dean could guess how whatever attacked Sam got in-and it wasn’t through the fucking door. On one side of the room there was a broken chair, its back legs splintered and folded beneath the seat of the chair itself while the font legs were just gone. Completely snapped off and probably used as weapons, if Sam had been lucky enough.
Everything else was just in complete disrepair, either on the floor, entirely ripped apart and just barely standing, halfway across the room or just beat up and sad looking. Dean frowned, Jessica had said everything had looked untouched when she let herself in, but the way things were, it looked like a kung fu battle had gone on and the weapons were the furniture.
Dean had the sneaking suspicion the furniture might have been already like that normally.
He shook his head, taking a step into the room, glass crunching under his boots. It felt like he was grounding evidence under his heel. He took another step and dug through his pocket for his handy walkman-cum-EMF meter. The thing was barely on for less than a second before it started screeching like a goddamn banshee--Dean quickly clicked it off, his ears ringing with the high pitched scream.
Shit.
Fuck.
Shit, shit, shit.
Dean set a hand over his mouth, rubbing his jaw as he swallowed painfully. He rubbed his face, swallowing again. He needed to move. Fuck, he really needed to move.
He moved towards the broken chair, careful not to step on anything besides the broken glass. There was no way not to step on the glass, it looked like the threadbare carpet was studded with jewels by the way the glass was spread across it. Dean crouched, chancing turning on the EMF meter again for less than a second with the same results as last time, only this time it sounded like the meter was going to break.
The EMF got stronger the more he went into the room? The more he got closer to the windows? That shit was strong at the door, just how insane was the son of a bitch that got in here? Just why did Sam think it was after Jessica, and how did Sam expect a salt line to protect her?
How did he know it would?
Dean eyed the chair, noting that it had broken backwards. Maybe Sam had been sitting there, waiting? Unsuspecting?
No, there was no way Sam wouldn’t have known what was going to happen, he’d just gotten back from his major freak out at Jessica’s. He knew something was coming and he knew it was big. Why come home just to sit?
Maybe he fell on it when the windows were blasted in, because there was no way all this glass came from one window pane. Not even two. Especially when the, count ‘em, four panes of glass (from what were probably the only windows in this place) were completely blown in and there wasn’t enough floor for the glass not to cover it.
Shit, Sam fought against the Terminator.
It better have been the fucking Terminator ‘cause if it was anything else it better hope to fucking God it could hide and could hide well.
Dean took a deep breath and stood. Someone must have heard this. A neighbor, someone walking by, somebody. But that was good, it’d mean they’d at least be able to tell him what whatever it was sounded like, if maybe there was a distinctive noise they could remember, and if they called the cops then there’d be a report filed out-unless everyone thought it was domestic dispute and stayed out of it.
Dean looked around the room. Domestic dispute, right.
He froze in his once over, on the other side of the room, just to the left of the doorway he had come through there was another doorway which probably led to where Sam slept. Unless he normally camped out on the couch and this was it. The glass on the floor was different there. All over the floor in the room the glass was pretty much evenly spaced-the shards closer together the more he got to the window and farther apart near the entranceway which was opposite to the windows all the way across the tiny box-like room.
But then there were some places where it wasn’t like that, where the glass was ground up and thrown around-like where Dean walked and other places that were much larger than just footprints.
There was blood on some of the glass. Dean grit his teeth. Duh there was gonna be blood, it was glass.
What was different at the doorway, though, was that compared to the glass where Dean had walked and where someone had obviously fallen-at the doorway it look as if something had been dragged out of the room. Something the size of a fully grown human male. The glass crunched dangerously under his heels and he hurried through the doorway after it, finding himself in another cramped hall where there were two doors.
And where there was more blood.
It felt like he was in Resident Evil only without the hot chicks, just him following after the trail of blood to find his brother. Dean pulled his gun from the waistband of his pants and cocked it, he really wanted to find whatever it was that did this-that made his brother’s life a living hell, even if it was only for one night.
It might have been more than one night, it could still have him.
Dean wanted to shoot holes into the walls.
--
The blood led to a bedroom, another small, cramped room just barely big enough to hold a twin sized mattress Sam probably fell off more than once. A few feet from that stood a tall, narrow dresser with four drawers that looked like the wood had been stained once, but now was just faded and old. On the wall there was an AC/DC poster with the cover art of The Razors Edge which brought an involuntary grin to Dean’s face when he saw it.
He didn’t think Sam had even liked AC/DC, guess he finally rubbed something good off before he left.
Dean eyed the floor, the trail had narrowed and stopped at the door to the room. There was no evidence the room had even been touched, which was odd mainly cause if whoever (whatever) had been dragged then the trail wouldn’t have narrowed at all and there’d be at least something in this room, even at the foot of the door. Or on the door.
Dean frowned, suddenly realizing he had been staring at the bottom of the dresser for at least a few minutes now. There was something peaking out from underneath, the corner of some paper or a photograph, maybe. The entire thing was completely tucked underneath, innocuously enough that Dean probably wouldn’t have even noticed it if he hadn’t been looking down.
After a nice little game of Kneel Down In The Cramped Room Where There Is No Space And Fish Under The Dresser For What Might Be A Birthday Card While Trying Not To Break Anything (they didn’t have many toys growing up), Dean finally managed to pinch the paper with two fingers and pull it out to find…
A picture of a blank wall.
The wall, the one in Sam’s room to adjacent to the dresser with the AC/DC poster pinned up on it now, Dean recognized the faded corner of the dresser that was barely noticeable in the bottom left hand side of the photograph. Dean raised a brow.
What the fuck? Sam was taking pictures of walls and hiding them where no one would find them-?
Wait.
Sam was taking pictures of walls and hiding them where no one would find them. He was also hiding phone numbers in bags of salt where no one would find them and hoping someone would. Because they had and when they did it meant something, so this wall meant something.
But maybe that was assuming a little too much, what if Dean had never found the picture in the first place? Sam couldn’t have known Dean would have been here or that Jessica would have found the list of phone numbers he had carefully stashed away. If anything, all this was probably gambled on the hope that someone would.
And it had paid off.
Dean was reminded of the game Sam had used to love when they were kids-at least the one he used to before he realized it was just another way for Dad to train them. One of them would go around hiding clues wherever they were staying at the time and when the other found the first clue it would lead them to another and another until finally they found the prize-usually something cheap and fun to play with.
Sam had always known where to hide them, but Dean had always known where to go.
He sighed, staring doubtfully down at the picture in his hand. This was some serious mindfuckery here and it wasn’t even remotely funny. At all. He was going to rip Sam a new one if this was his idea of fun.
But what the hell, what did he have to lose? Besides the cool poster and possible blackmail material against Sammy, anyway. Dean was so stealing it for all this shit.
He took a deep breath and skirted between the dresser and the bed over to the wall, having no room to walk. There was seriously about four inches to lift his feet, if he bothered to try he’d have tripped over the mattress and hit the goddamn wall. What the fuck did Sam do, jump everywhere?
That mental image was just too good.
Dean grinned, slipping his fingers beneath one corner of the poster before carefully prying it up. He didn’t even have to bother doing any more than that, the thing was put up so poorly that just screwing with the one corner brought the entire poster crashing down much faster than a flimsy piece of paper should have. Kneeling down, Dean grabbed the poster and carefully flipped it over, finding a thin DVD case duct taped to the back with the words ‘WATCH ME’ written in a thick black marker in Sam’s handwriting.
…He was related to Lewis Fucking Carroll.
Why couldn’t Sam just have gotten him a beer and wrote ‘drink me’ on it? It’d take less time, spare Dean’s sanity and there’d be less blood to get out of the carpet. Everyone would end up happily ever after, the end.
Dean ripped the poster when he pulled the case from its taping.
--
He should have waited for Dad.
Dad was just in town, going around investigating like Dean should have been-he had every right to be there to watch it too.
He should have, but he didn’t, fucked up as that was. With the DVD case in his hot little hands Dean couldn’t just sit around taking EMF measurements until his ears started to bleed. And Dean had been through the whole place twice, there was just glass, blood and a home Sam had probably loved more than he should’ve.
There was nothing else.
But there was Sam’s laptop that had somehow miraculously survived the onslaught of glass and whatever else had been thrown at it. If anything, that’d be able to play DVDs, if only because Sam was anal as fuck and if he couldn’t do anything that school wanted him to he’d go out and get it.
That and Sam was pretty much useless at making cool passwords--‘baskerville’, really? Who didn’t see that one coming?
And Dean was right, not only was Sam’s computer organized by function, but the thing could probably start up a car if he really wanted to try it. Dean rolled his eyes, setting up camp in Sam’s bedroom only because gaping windows at his back in a room with so much EMF the walls might as well start coming alive wasn’t a place he wanted to sit in for a slumber party.
He’d seen Rose Red, thank you very much.
He wasn’t being a girl by plopping down Sammy’s bed (though he did want to dig through his stuff for some more blackmail material, where was Sammy’s diary?).
The laptop whirred for a moment after the DVD was inserted; Dean eyed the thing for a long moment, watching the little light near the side of the keyboard flicker. Maybe this thing didn’t survive whatever was thrown at it. The screen darkened for a moment then a screen popped up, Dean half expected it to come with a message ‘We’re sorry, Sam’s gone, get over it’, but it was just the DVD auto-playing.
Dean settled back, eyes narrowing in confusion as a video of Sam laughingly talking about the joys of college started up. Sam… Sam looked happy in the stupid video, grinning at whoever held the camera and looking like he hadn’t had a care in the world. Dean couldn’t remember the last time he had seen him so carefree and not about ready to haul off on someone.
…Why did Sam want him to see this? Was he trying to say something or-
A minute in the video cut off with Sam talking about Art Appreciation and suddenly changed to something much different. It was still Sam, but he didn’t look so loose limbed anymore. Instead he looked tired, like he’d been on the road just a little too long. Now he was in what Dean recognized as his tiny little living room, behind Sam he could see the wall that ran along behind the couch and part of said couch’s beat up armrest.
He was sitting in the chair, Dean thought stupidly. That stupid fucked up chair that was missing two legs. Sam had made this just before whatever happened, that was why he had been sitting.
”Dean?”
Dean jerked in surprise.
”Dean, if anyone found this, it’d be you, so…” Dean watched as Sam rubbed his eyes. ”I really need your help.”
You’re my only hope, Dean mentally added, maybe just a bit freaked out. Sam was acting like a cross between Yoda and four years old, Dean kinda hoped this was all just some elaborate scheme to get a bed time story.
…and for Fuck’s sake, stop quoting Star Wars.
Dean laughed, maybe just a little wigged out. Sam was acting as if he could see him.
”But if you’re watching this,” the recording continued. “you probably already know the shit has hit the fan. I… can’t tell you what’s going on right now, but it’s big.”
No shit. Sam’s eyes flickered to what Dean could tell was the direction of the windows before returning to the screen. He looked freaked.
”You’re not going to believe me when I say this, you didn’t the last time, but I have these dreams… And sometimes they come true.”
…What? Sam had frozen, an odd look on his face as if he had shocked himself by the words, but before long he was shaking his head again. Dean just stared incredulously; his little brother couldn’t have been off his rocker… Right? Maybe he was gone because he thought the world was ending on Sunday and he needed to build an Ark.
“I know you don’t believe this but it’s true, I know you’re here with Dad, I know you came to my apartment alone, I know you found the picture under the dresser because that’s why I put it there. I can tell you everything you did up until now because I dreamed it. And I dreamed this, too.”
The exhausted look had returned.
”Dean, I know what killed mom.” Shit, like Sam didn’t already have his attention. ”I know what he is, I know who he is and I know how powerful he is and the more you know about him the more dangerous you become to him. Dean… he kills Dad. In two and a half years, Dad dies… and then in a year after that, I die too.”
Dean wanted to throw the laptop against the wall in a fit of panic. No, no. Sam was wrong about that one. He wanted to shout, give the neighbors something else to talk about. Fucking haunted apartment 14A which was really 13D but who really gave a fuck. The only thing that stopped him was Sam was still going.
”…But I think I know how to stop him, stop all of it.” Sam’s eyes had brightened on the screen, he looked so goddamn hopeful. Dean’s head hurt, why did Sam have to be the one to do this? ”I think I can stop everyone from dying and if I’m right, when you’re watching this then I’ll be gone. I need you to do me a favor and not look for me.”
Fuck that! What was he supposed to do, sit on his goddamn hands and hope his baby brother wasn’t dead in a ditch somewhere? He wasn’t good at that; he barely sat still long enough to plan out what he and Dad were going to do before they got here. If this all turned out to be a trap.
How the hell was he supposed to wait for some signal from God to let him know what was going on?
Sam had a wry look on his face. ”I know you’re probably freaking out right about now, but just hear me out. The thing that killed mom is a…” He looked torn. Unsure whether to reveal what it was or to just stay vague and play it safe.
“C’mon, Sammy,” Dean muttered under his breath. Sam sighed. Dean kinda wished Sam would stop acting like he could see what he was doing, it was really beginning to give him the heebie-jeebies.
”…It’s a demon. That’s all I can say right now, and I’m saying it only because you have to be careful. You can’t let Dad try to go hunt this thing because that’s what starts the whole chain of events that gets us killed.” His chest hurt. God, he wished Sam was right here so he could whack him upside the head in person.
“ But there’s two different weapons against them. If you find any weapon you’ll have something against them.”
Dean was already itching to move, but it wasn’t for any fucking weapon.
”Now listen to me, you have to do this and you have to go in order or else it’s useless. Tucson, Salt Lake City, Dallas and Omaha. Tuscon is in the woods, Salt Lake City in the sky, Dallas is on fire, and Omaha is flooding. You’re looking for coins, Dean, once you finish it’ll be worth it.” Sam shook his head again. ”Don't trust anyone, be wary of even the people you know.”
Dean had frozen. If that wasn’t cryptic like fuck.
”…And Dean?” Sam paused, looking back towards where the windows were. Suddenly, he frowned before the looked was quickly replaced with awe, of all fucking things, and the video shorted out.
--
“Your mission, whether you choose to accept it,” Dean intoned dramatically as he pried the front door open. “Is to kick your baby brother’s ass when he is found. This DVD will self destruct in ten seconds.”
-*-
Sam leaves Wyoming after that. The diner’s left him with just a little too much nervous energy and an itch in between his shoulder blades that leaves him unable to sit still for too long. He doesn't wait until the sun's up to start heading east to Nebraska. It's not too dark to see, and if he grips his phone and wishes it would work, that Dean would call (because Sam would pick up this time, damnit, he would) then it's only because he's being illogical.
Because it doesn't work and it doesn't ring and Sam’s alone. But he's doing just fine.
--
There is just about as much nothing in Nebraska as there is in Wyoming, just without as many trees.
--
In Colorado he meets a young medicine woman who claims to know Sam inside out (in so many words). She comes out of nowhere-one minute he's alone with his thoughts, the next there's a dark haired slip of a girl with no shoes prattling nonsense about games, gates, homes, and shoes sizes. The only reason he even knows she’s a medicine woman is because of her bag and because Sam had begged one for help when he was twelve years old and Dean was bleeding all over the road. They all had the same look about them, too, even if none of them ever looked the same.
When Sam smiles politely in attempt to escape she grabs his arm, surprising him with a strong grip for someone so small.
"Wandering in circles, Sam Winchester. You're covering your tracks but the hounds still chase."
She smiles when Sam stops short and abruptly turns to face her, absent mindedly taking note of disturbingly white and straight teeth. He can't say he's ever met anyone fully immersed in the realm of the supernatural that tried to keep themselves well-kempt. Well, anyone besides the frauds, anyway.
Maybe he's read too much Ulysses.
"I don't have to be blind to see," she tells him, amused (did he say that aloud?). She continues before he can say anything, "Go home. It was never safe, but it is sound-just be careful. Not all the hounds are faithful."
“Wait-”
And with that, she turns and disappears back into the trees, leaving Sam with the feeling that he missed something.
--
Note to self: Running off the road to chase after a mysterious girl who speaks in riddles is a stupid idea.
Way to go, Sam.
--
There's a good chance he might be lost. About a 90 percent probability. The other ten percent is the part of Sam's brain that’s optimistic and thinks there might be a chance he’ll find his way out--though it’s the part that had originally thought 'hey, I can make it at Stanford' and the even better 'I can be normal', so it's not really all that reliable.
Sam sighs, eyeing the trees around him.
There’s no way out of here.
“Going about it the wrong way.”
Sam whirls, the young woman is there again looking curiously severe.
“Can’t take two jumps forward and then expect to go backwards without help.”
Sam frowns, he’s good at riddles, why can’t he get this? He’s forgetting something, it’s on the tip of his tongue but he can’t grab it.
There’s three boys sitting in the courtyard. Sam clutches his head. No. One down, three to go.
No, no.
“Three little monkies, jumping on the bed, one fell off and bumped his head,” the woman whispers “Don’t know how to close the door just yet.”
And then she’s gone again.
Part Four
“Tell me what you got,” Dad asked, well, demanded in the form of a question, when they got outside. Dean frowned, dredging up the last few minutes of conversation which had turned up absolutely nothing new. It was all just speculation and theories, nothing concrete.
“Not much, just the same thing she told me on the phone except she also mentioned that Sam was having nightmares.”
”I didn’t think anything of it.”
She had looked apologetic, but Dean didn’t really see how that could have been something she’d write in her diary about later.
If she knew what was behind what went bump in the night then yeah, maybe she’d pay more attention, but right then it was like trying to remember what kind of shoes someone had been wearing and how they tied the laces when the sky had fallen.
“Did she say what they were about?”
Dean shook his head. “She didn’t think they were anything but stress related.”
Dad looked like he could have made a face as he turned out into the street. Dean could relate, they were literally blind, deaf and dumb here and still they were being asked to try and find a frickin’ needle in a haystack with their hands tied. The space between them filled with silence for a long moment, the kind so thick Dean could probably dig through with a spoon.
“When did they start?”
“The nightmares?”
Dad nodded, turning right back on the road they came on. Surprisingly enough, according to one Jessica Moore, Sam had only lived a few blocks away. Something Dean couldn’t picture for the life of him--Sam, living in a foofy place? No way-really. No way.
Fuck, Sam said he had wanted normal, but that was just way beyond anything remotely resembling it.
“She said he first mentioned them a few months ago.”
“Mentioned,” Dad repeated. “Meaning he could have been having them long before then, too.”
“Yeah.”
This just kept getting weirder and weirder and all of it revolved around Sam.
Why?
What had Sam have done in the last year and a half to possibly rile up something supernatural and insanely psychotic? The kid wasn’t a block of wood, as much as he hated hunting he wasn’t just gonna ignore everything he was taught. The salt lines in Jessica’s apartment that Sam had carefully lain down was enough proof of that. So what the hell could have happened a few months ago to lead up to this?
“Here’s what we’re gonna have to do. I’m going to drop you off at the apartment and I want you to search it, thoroughly-” Dean couldn’t help the slight mental flinch at that. When had he ever not done his job with a fine toothed comb? And when had he ever slacked off whenever it came to Sammy? “-And I’m gonna lift a few stones to see if maybe something happened around the time he started having the bad dreams.”
Dean nodded. Sir, yes sir. Dad glanced over at him before returning the nod.
“Keep a low profile. We have a civilian who can vouch for us, but it doesn’t mean we can afford to bring too much attention to ourselves. You find something suspicious that’ll get the cops called on you then you call me. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
Dad nodded again, good.
No more words were shared for the rest of the drive.
Said rest of the drive happened to turn out to be ten minutes away from Jessica’s place anyway, so it wasn’t dramatic as it sounded. You know, without cheesy music and all that jazz.
Sam’s apartment turned out to be a complex that looked more like a motel than anything else. There were four identical sets that each had two stories which were located directly next to the other with each compact and… box shaped. It was kind of a bizarre Twilight Zone effect, to have the Bronx just five blocks away from Malibu-that just five blocks away from Barbie’s Summer Home was Almost A Hobo Joe’s Box-House.
Though, as much as he hated to think it, this was more like it. This was definitely the kind of place Dean could see Sam being comfortable in, a place that was his that he was probably so damn proud of regardless how shitty it was just cause he had gotten it all on his own.
Dad pulled up to the curb and eyed the place with him, making judgments with the analyzations. Dean got the feeling he already knew what Dad was thinking--it wasn’t good enough--but that reaction was kind of expected. Sam had left them for this, after all.
“You got the room number?” he said when he finally stopped eying the place like a kid at the dentist. Dean nodded.
“13D.”
“You got your phone?”
“Right here.” Dean patted his jacket pocket with one hand.
“Got the supplies?”
“In the trunk.” As usual.
Finally Dad seemed satisfied, having finished giving Dean the run down. “Alright, I’m going to interview his friends and check to see if anything happened in the last couple of months.” Dean could practically hear the stay out of trouble on the tip of his tongue. He got out of the car before Dad could actually think to say it and moved to the back to fish out his junk from the trunk. Dad waited a second longer after Dean slammed the trunk closed, maybe to say something. Give some advice, maybe?
Whatever it was, he changed his mind and the moment was gone just like that--with it Dad’s face closed up like the door slamming shut on a vault. He gave Dean a final nod and pulled back into traffic.
--
Okay, Dean was really beginning to wonder how Sam met a chick like Jessica. It might have been around the fifteenth crack in the cement path that had weeds struggling to push through; something this place seemed to have a lot of.
But the thought kind of bothered him. Jessica was this rich, upper class chick who could probably buy Sam’s apartment and use it to store her shoes (if she had that many shoes) and still go out and buy some awesome yacht with the spare change. Sam, honest to god, probably had been just barely scraping by on his scholarship-counting pennies and using inventive alternatives to save cash. Dean wasn’t stupid enough to say Sam probably hadn’t been making it, because when Sam put his nose to the grindstone he was practically MacGyver, but that didn’t mean he was swimming in it.
So how did the two of them meet? Did Sam run into her? Did Jessica save him from some damsel-y in distress type situation?
Maybe he was thinking too much into it, as much as he hated to say it--not all rich bastards were snobs just like not all poor bastards were humble. Maybe they just met and got along and hit it off so well they decided to hook up. Who knew.
Dean climbed the stairs to the second story walkway, keeping his eyes on the numbers next to the doors as they increased.
12A… B… C… D…
And finally 13. And Sam’s was… D? Dean frowned. There was A, B, and C, but then it went straight to apartment 14A which was missing its gilded lettering. He could only tell what it was only by the outline of dirt of what had been the ‘14A’. What the fuck. Dean backtracked, started again at the start of the row at 10A and went back through until he once again reached the corner at 14A.
Still no 13D, not even on the second time through. Dean wasn’t just missing this thing, it just wasn’t there.
Seriously, what the fuck? Did Sam live in Narnia?
Maybe Sam lived in one of those magical apartments that only appeared when you were ten feet tall, had horns and a canopy for hair. Dean eyed what was the address to 14A again then eyed the other apartments which all still had their lettering. Crappy assed as they were, they were still there, which kind of gave Dean a bit of a clue.
He was going to take a leap of faith here and hope to hell he wasn’t breaking into someone’s home. Dad had told him not to get arrested, after all. Dean sighed, taking out the key Jessica had given him and sticking it in the lock to door 14A.
Surprise, surprise, the stupid thing fit. Which either meant all the locks in this complex were the exact same, Jessica had a skeleton key (which would have been awesome and just vaguely suspicious) or the landlord was a fucking idiot and didn’t replace the lettering with the right address.
It was kind of sad that after all the years of dealing with douche bag landlords that he still hoped it was one of the former. Dean pushed against the door, when it didn’t budge he leaned his weight against it and shoved, nearly falling in when the door unstuck and swung in. It sounded like the building was going to fall down on him, that was so comforting.
Sometimes Dean wished they got hazard pay for this job.
He slipped inside, shutting the door behind him. At the very least, with a shitty door like that, Sam would know if something was coming and have time to… He didn’t know, maybe ready an arsenal while the thing cursed and kicked at the door? Once inside, Dean found himself in a small, slightly cramped hall which he could see eventually ended about five feet away before expanding into what looked like the apartment itself. From where he stood Dean could see a beat up couch and what had to be the disaster zone Jessica had mentioned before.
She wasn’t kidding when she said it looked like a bomb went off.
He stopped just before entering the room and looked around. There was glass everywhere, it was like a goddamn car crash, and by the sorry state the windows were in Dean could guess how whatever attacked Sam got in-and it wasn’t through the fucking door. On one side of the room there was a broken chair, its back legs splintered and folded beneath the seat of the chair itself while the font legs were just gone. Completely snapped off and probably used as weapons, if Sam had been lucky enough.
Everything else was just in complete disrepair, either on the floor, entirely ripped apart and just barely standing, halfway across the room or just beat up and sad looking. Dean frowned, Jessica had said everything had looked untouched when she let herself in, but the way things were, it looked like a kung fu battle had gone on and the weapons were the furniture.
Dean had the sneaking suspicion the furniture might have been already like that normally.
He shook his head, taking a step into the room, glass crunching under his boots. It felt like he was grounding evidence under his heel. He took another step and dug through his pocket for his handy walkman-cum-EMF meter. The thing was barely on for less than a second before it started screeching like a goddamn banshee--Dean quickly clicked it off, his ears ringing with the high pitched scream.
Shit.
Fuck.
Shit, shit, shit.
Dean set a hand over his mouth, rubbing his jaw as he swallowed painfully. He rubbed his face, swallowing again. He needed to move. Fuck, he really needed to move.
He moved towards the broken chair, careful not to step on anything besides the broken glass. There was no way not to step on the glass, it looked like the threadbare carpet was studded with jewels by the way the glass was spread across it. Dean crouched, chancing turning on the EMF meter again for less than a second with the same results as last time, only this time it sounded like the meter was going to break.
The EMF got stronger the more he went into the room? The more he got closer to the windows? That shit was strong at the door, just how insane was the son of a bitch that got in here? Just why did Sam think it was after Jessica, and how did Sam expect a salt line to protect her?
How did he know it would?
Dean eyed the chair, noting that it had broken backwards. Maybe Sam had been sitting there, waiting? Unsuspecting?
No, there was no way Sam wouldn’t have known what was going to happen, he’d just gotten back from his major freak out at Jessica’s. He knew something was coming and he knew it was big. Why come home just to sit?
Maybe he fell on it when the windows were blasted in, because there was no way all this glass came from one window pane. Not even two. Especially when the, count ‘em, four panes of glass (from what were probably the only windows in this place) were completely blown in and there wasn’t enough floor for the glass not to cover it.
Shit, Sam fought against the Terminator.
It better have been the fucking Terminator ‘cause if it was anything else it better hope to fucking God it could hide and could hide well.
Dean took a deep breath and stood. Someone must have heard this. A neighbor, someone walking by, somebody. But that was good, it’d mean they’d at least be able to tell him what whatever it was sounded like, if maybe there was a distinctive noise they could remember, and if they called the cops then there’d be a report filed out-unless everyone thought it was domestic dispute and stayed out of it.
Dean looked around the room. Domestic dispute, right.
He froze in his once over, on the other side of the room, just to the left of the doorway he had come through there was another doorway which probably led to where Sam slept. Unless he normally camped out on the couch and this was it. The glass on the floor was different there. All over the floor in the room the glass was pretty much evenly spaced-the shards closer together the more he got to the window and farther apart near the entranceway which was opposite to the windows all the way across the tiny box-like room.
But then there were some places where it wasn’t like that, where the glass was ground up and thrown around-like where Dean walked and other places that were much larger than just footprints.
There was blood on some of the glass. Dean grit his teeth. Duh there was gonna be blood, it was glass.
What was different at the doorway, though, was that compared to the glass where Dean had walked and where someone had obviously fallen-at the doorway it look as if something had been dragged out of the room. Something the size of a fully grown human male. The glass crunched dangerously under his heels and he hurried through the doorway after it, finding himself in another cramped hall where there were two doors.
And where there was more blood.
It felt like he was in Resident Evil only without the hot chicks, just him following after the trail of blood to find his brother. Dean pulled his gun from the waistband of his pants and cocked it, he really wanted to find whatever it was that did this-that made his brother’s life a living hell, even if it was only for one night.
It might have been more than one night, it could still have him.
Dean wanted to shoot holes into the walls.
--
The blood led to a bedroom, another small, cramped room just barely big enough to hold a twin sized mattress Sam probably fell off more than once. A few feet from that stood a tall, narrow dresser with four drawers that looked like the wood had been stained once, but now was just faded and old. On the wall there was an AC/DC poster with the cover art of The Razors Edge which brought an involuntary grin to Dean’s face when he saw it.
He didn’t think Sam had even liked AC/DC, guess he finally rubbed something good off before he left.
Dean eyed the floor, the trail had narrowed and stopped at the door to the room. There was no evidence the room had even been touched, which was odd mainly cause if whoever (whatever) had been dragged then the trail wouldn’t have narrowed at all and there’d be at least something in this room, even at the foot of the door. Or on the door.
Dean frowned, suddenly realizing he had been staring at the bottom of the dresser for at least a few minutes now. There was something peaking out from underneath, the corner of some paper or a photograph, maybe. The entire thing was completely tucked underneath, innocuously enough that Dean probably wouldn’t have even noticed it if he hadn’t been looking down.
After a nice little game of Kneel Down In The Cramped Room Where There Is No Space And Fish Under The Dresser For What Might Be A Birthday Card While Trying Not To Break Anything (they didn’t have many toys growing up), Dean finally managed to pinch the paper with two fingers and pull it out to find…
A picture of a blank wall.
The wall, the one in Sam’s room to adjacent to the dresser with the AC/DC poster pinned up on it now, Dean recognized the faded corner of the dresser that was barely noticeable in the bottom left hand side of the photograph. Dean raised a brow.
What the fuck? Sam was taking pictures of walls and hiding them where no one would find them-?
Wait.
Sam was taking pictures of walls and hiding them where no one would find them. He was also hiding phone numbers in bags of salt where no one would find them and hoping someone would. Because they had and when they did it meant something, so this wall meant something.
But maybe that was assuming a little too much, what if Dean had never found the picture in the first place? Sam couldn’t have known Dean would have been here or that Jessica would have found the list of phone numbers he had carefully stashed away. If anything, all this was probably gambled on the hope that someone would.
And it had paid off.
Dean was reminded of the game Sam had used to love when they were kids-at least the one he used to before he realized it was just another way for Dad to train them. One of them would go around hiding clues wherever they were staying at the time and when the other found the first clue it would lead them to another and another until finally they found the prize-usually something cheap and fun to play with.
Sam had always known where to hide them, but Dean had always known where to go.
He sighed, staring doubtfully down at the picture in his hand. This was some serious mindfuckery here and it wasn’t even remotely funny. At all. He was going to rip Sam a new one if this was his idea of fun.
But what the hell, what did he have to lose? Besides the cool poster and possible blackmail material against Sammy, anyway. Dean was so stealing it for all this shit.
He took a deep breath and skirted between the dresser and the bed over to the wall, having no room to walk. There was seriously about four inches to lift his feet, if he bothered to try he’d have tripped over the mattress and hit the goddamn wall. What the fuck did Sam do, jump everywhere?
That mental image was just too good.
Dean grinned, slipping his fingers beneath one corner of the poster before carefully prying it up. He didn’t even have to bother doing any more than that, the thing was put up so poorly that just screwing with the one corner brought the entire poster crashing down much faster than a flimsy piece of paper should have. Kneeling down, Dean grabbed the poster and carefully flipped it over, finding a thin DVD case duct taped to the back with the words ‘WATCH ME’ written in a thick black marker in Sam’s handwriting.
…He was related to Lewis Fucking Carroll.
Why couldn’t Sam just have gotten him a beer and wrote ‘drink me’ on it? It’d take less time, spare Dean’s sanity and there’d be less blood to get out of the carpet. Everyone would end up happily ever after, the end.
Dean ripped the poster when he pulled the case from its taping.
--
He should have waited for Dad.
Dad was just in town, going around investigating like Dean should have been-he had every right to be there to watch it too.
He should have, but he didn’t, fucked up as that was. With the DVD case in his hot little hands Dean couldn’t just sit around taking EMF measurements until his ears started to bleed. And Dean had been through the whole place twice, there was just glass, blood and a home Sam had probably loved more than he should’ve.
There was nothing else.
But there was Sam’s laptop that had somehow miraculously survived the onslaught of glass and whatever else had been thrown at it. If anything, that’d be able to play DVDs, if only because Sam was anal as fuck and if he couldn’t do anything that school wanted him to he’d go out and get it.
That and Sam was pretty much useless at making cool passwords--‘baskerville’, really? Who didn’t see that one coming?
And Dean was right, not only was Sam’s computer organized by function, but the thing could probably start up a car if he really wanted to try it. Dean rolled his eyes, setting up camp in Sam’s bedroom only because gaping windows at his back in a room with so much EMF the walls might as well start coming alive wasn’t a place he wanted to sit in for a slumber party.
He’d seen Rose Red, thank you very much.
He wasn’t being a girl by plopping down Sammy’s bed (though he did want to dig through his stuff for some more blackmail material, where was Sammy’s diary?).
The laptop whirred for a moment after the DVD was inserted; Dean eyed the thing for a long moment, watching the little light near the side of the keyboard flicker. Maybe this thing didn’t survive whatever was thrown at it. The screen darkened for a moment then a screen popped up, Dean half expected it to come with a message ‘We’re sorry, Sam’s gone, get over it’, but it was just the DVD auto-playing.
Dean settled back, eyes narrowing in confusion as a video of Sam laughingly talking about the joys of college started up. Sam… Sam looked happy in the stupid video, grinning at whoever held the camera and looking like he hadn’t had a care in the world. Dean couldn’t remember the last time he had seen him so carefree and not about ready to haul off on someone.
…Why did Sam want him to see this? Was he trying to say something or-
A minute in the video cut off with Sam talking about Art Appreciation and suddenly changed to something much different. It was still Sam, but he didn’t look so loose limbed anymore. Instead he looked tired, like he’d been on the road just a little too long. Now he was in what Dean recognized as his tiny little living room, behind Sam he could see the wall that ran along behind the couch and part of said couch’s beat up armrest.
He was sitting in the chair, Dean thought stupidly. That stupid fucked up chair that was missing two legs. Sam had made this just before whatever happened, that was why he had been sitting.
”Dean?”
Dean jerked in surprise.
”Dean, if anyone found this, it’d be you, so…” Dean watched as Sam rubbed his eyes. ”I really need your help.”
You’re my only hope, Dean mentally added, maybe just a bit freaked out. Sam was acting like a cross between Yoda and four years old, Dean kinda hoped this was all just some elaborate scheme to get a bed time story.
…and for Fuck’s sake, stop quoting Star Wars.
Dean laughed, maybe just a little wigged out. Sam was acting as if he could see him.
”But if you’re watching this,” the recording continued. “you probably already know the shit has hit the fan. I… can’t tell you what’s going on right now, but it’s big.”
No shit. Sam’s eyes flickered to what Dean could tell was the direction of the windows before returning to the screen. He looked freaked.
”You’re not going to believe me when I say this, you didn’t the last time, but I have these dreams… And sometimes they come true.”
…What? Sam had frozen, an odd look on his face as if he had shocked himself by the words, but before long he was shaking his head again. Dean just stared incredulously; his little brother couldn’t have been off his rocker… Right? Maybe he was gone because he thought the world was ending on Sunday and he needed to build an Ark.
“I know you don’t believe this but it’s true, I know you’re here with Dad, I know you came to my apartment alone, I know you found the picture under the dresser because that’s why I put it there. I can tell you everything you did up until now because I dreamed it. And I dreamed this, too.”
The exhausted look had returned.
”Dean, I know what killed mom.” Shit, like Sam didn’t already have his attention. ”I know what he is, I know who he is and I know how powerful he is and the more you know about him the more dangerous you become to him. Dean… he kills Dad. In two and a half years, Dad dies… and then in a year after that, I die too.”
Dean wanted to throw the laptop against the wall in a fit of panic. No, no. Sam was wrong about that one. He wanted to shout, give the neighbors something else to talk about. Fucking haunted apartment 14A which was really 13D but who really gave a fuck. The only thing that stopped him was Sam was still going.
”…But I think I know how to stop him, stop all of it.” Sam’s eyes had brightened on the screen, he looked so goddamn hopeful. Dean’s head hurt, why did Sam have to be the one to do this? ”I think I can stop everyone from dying and if I’m right, when you’re watching this then I’ll be gone. I need you to do me a favor and not look for me.”
Fuck that! What was he supposed to do, sit on his goddamn hands and hope his baby brother wasn’t dead in a ditch somewhere? He wasn’t good at that; he barely sat still long enough to plan out what he and Dad were going to do before they got here. If this all turned out to be a trap.
How the hell was he supposed to wait for some signal from God to let him know what was going on?
Sam had a wry look on his face. ”I know you’re probably freaking out right about now, but just hear me out. The thing that killed mom is a…” He looked torn. Unsure whether to reveal what it was or to just stay vague and play it safe.
“C’mon, Sammy,” Dean muttered under his breath. Sam sighed. Dean kinda wished Sam would stop acting like he could see what he was doing, it was really beginning to give him the heebie-jeebies.
”…It’s a demon. That’s all I can say right now, and I’m saying it only because you have to be careful. You can’t let Dad try to go hunt this thing because that’s what starts the whole chain of events that gets us killed.” His chest hurt. God, he wished Sam was right here so he could whack him upside the head in person.
“ But there’s two different weapons against them. If you find any weapon you’ll have something against them.”
Dean was already itching to move, but it wasn’t for any fucking weapon.
”Now listen to me, you have to do this and you have to go in order or else it’s useless. Tucson, Salt Lake City, Dallas and Omaha. Tuscon is in the woods, Salt Lake City in the sky, Dallas is on fire, and Omaha is flooding. You’re looking for coins, Dean, once you finish it’ll be worth it.” Sam shook his head again. ”Don't trust anyone, be wary of even the people you know.”
Dean had frozen. If that wasn’t cryptic like fuck.
”…And Dean?” Sam paused, looking back towards where the windows were. Suddenly, he frowned before the looked was quickly replaced with awe, of all fucking things, and the video shorted out.
--
“Your mission, whether you choose to accept it,” Dean intoned dramatically as he pried the front door open. “Is to kick your baby brother’s ass when he is found. This DVD will self destruct in ten seconds.”
-*-
Sam leaves Wyoming after that. The diner’s left him with just a little too much nervous energy and an itch in between his shoulder blades that leaves him unable to sit still for too long. He doesn't wait until the sun's up to start heading east to Nebraska. It's not too dark to see, and if he grips his phone and wishes it would work, that Dean would call (because Sam would pick up this time, damnit, he would) then it's only because he's being illogical.
Because it doesn't work and it doesn't ring and Sam’s alone. But he's doing just fine.
--
There is just about as much nothing in Nebraska as there is in Wyoming, just without as many trees.
--
In Colorado he meets a young medicine woman who claims to know Sam inside out (in so many words). She comes out of nowhere-one minute he's alone with his thoughts, the next there's a dark haired slip of a girl with no shoes prattling nonsense about games, gates, homes, and shoes sizes. The only reason he even knows she’s a medicine woman is because of her bag and because Sam had begged one for help when he was twelve years old and Dean was bleeding all over the road. They all had the same look about them, too, even if none of them ever looked the same.
When Sam smiles politely in attempt to escape she grabs his arm, surprising him with a strong grip for someone so small.
"Wandering in circles, Sam Winchester. You're covering your tracks but the hounds still chase."
She smiles when Sam stops short and abruptly turns to face her, absent mindedly taking note of disturbingly white and straight teeth. He can't say he's ever met anyone fully immersed in the realm of the supernatural that tried to keep themselves well-kempt. Well, anyone besides the frauds, anyway.
Maybe he's read too much Ulysses.
"I don't have to be blind to see," she tells him, amused (did he say that aloud?). She continues before he can say anything, "Go home. It was never safe, but it is sound-just be careful. Not all the hounds are faithful."
“Wait-”
And with that, she turns and disappears back into the trees, leaving Sam with the feeling that he missed something.
--
Note to self: Running off the road to chase after a mysterious girl who speaks in riddles is a stupid idea.
Way to go, Sam.
--
There's a good chance he might be lost. About a 90 percent probability. The other ten percent is the part of Sam's brain that’s optimistic and thinks there might be a chance he’ll find his way out--though it’s the part that had originally thought 'hey, I can make it at Stanford' and the even better 'I can be normal', so it's not really all that reliable.
Sam sighs, eyeing the trees around him.
There’s no way out of here.
“Going about it the wrong way.”
Sam whirls, the young woman is there again looking curiously severe.
“Can’t take two jumps forward and then expect to go backwards without help.”
Sam frowns, he’s good at riddles, why can’t he get this? He’s forgetting something, it’s on the tip of his tongue but he can’t grab it.
There’s three boys sitting in the courtyard. Sam clutches his head. No. One down, three to go.
No, no.
“Three little monkies, jumping on the bed, one fell off and bumped his head,” the woman whispers “Don’t know how to close the door just yet.”
And then she’s gone again.
Part Four