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annabethbigbangSilvery eyes. Silvery hair. This young man is something otherworldly, and the woman in front of him bows down, long blonde hair falling across her face, and puts her palms together like a prayer.
He doesn't waste any time, and in the distance, lightning strikes as he puts one hand on the top of her head.
She whispers, hands still clasped, and he begins to speak.
Every word is a benediction, spoken in a voice not heard for centuries. But she remembers, and turns her face up. Receives his blessing.
He smiles, fingers trailing through her hair.
It's too silent in the room. Ever since Dean got back from Hell, moments like this fill him with foreboding, even if it's the only way Sam can sleep, and Dean has to force himself not to get up and turn the TV on just for the background noise.
It would seem strange, like screams and cries for help would make it worse, but Dean loves horror movies more than ever now, the violence and gore and titties, and maybe that's why, because he knows that shit on the TV isn't real. It's not like his memories, filled with the type of reality that makes his current situation seem like a dream, like maybe he's not lying in bed at four in the morning, Sam's breathing indiscernible in the darkness, thinking about getting a beer and trying not to jump at the very silence.
"Dude," Sam says in a voice ragged from sleep, "I can hear you thinking, man. Why aren't you asleep?"
Dean's ashamed of how relieved he is to have something to listen to. He shifts in bed, rolling onto his side and trying to figure out which dark shape in the pitch black is Sam, and then one of the mounds of shadow moves and Dean -- well, he totally doesn't gasp like a little girl. Sam laughs, a little broken snort.
"You're a pussy, Dean," he says, and Dean doesn't want to think about whether those words are true, about whether Hell changed him into something different than what he was before. (Like if he's a little more inhuman, if Hell managed to tear away layers of his humanity, if he was close to becoming a demon before he got out.)
"I most certainly am not," he says instead, and he can practically hear Sam's forehead wrinkle.
"Dean, how long have you been lying there awake?" he asks, and flattens out on the bed. Dean does the same, even though he can't actually see the ceiling. But when he closes his eyes, he sees flames and wild, feral eyes, so he opens them again and stares at nothing. It's unusual to be in a place with no streetlights to fill in the dark corners, but they're in a room at the back, and the window shades are surprisingly thick.
"I'm just thinking," Dean hedges. "It's such a pretty night."
"Bullshit," Sam says, the sound of something flopping against something else. Dean figures Sam just covered his eyes with his arm. When he speaks again it's a little muffled. "You never talk about the weather, you're not a poetic soul unless it's a vulgar limerick, and you've never much cared to share mushy sentiments like that with me, so fuck off, Dean, and tell me what the fuck is really going on."
"It's been quiet for months, Sam. No seals breaking, no Castiel swooping in to impart doom and gloom, not even a good case in weeks. What are we even doing right now? Sticking our thumbs up our asses and waiting for Lilith to get the jump on us again?"
Sam huffs out a breath. "I don't know, Dean. It would actually be preferable if Castiel would show up and give us some insight."
"Yeah, and you, too, Sam. You gonna tell me you're not having visions any more?"
Sam sighs again, long and gustily. "It's not like that. I don't see people die any more. I don't even really see the future, I just dream about Lilith constantly."
"Do you ever get to see what she's doing?" Dean's less curious and more concerned now. Sam hasn't mentioned this before.
"No, nothing. I just get these little sensations, like when she's moving hosts, or whatever. I never even see the hosts' faces, I just sorta, I can't explain it. It's not a vision any longer." Sam blows out another breath. "Sometimes I see destruction, but I don't sense Lilith then. It's weird. It's like -- I can't place it." Sam goes really quiet.
"We gotta do something, be proactive," Dean grumbles into the darkness. "Is it -- Sam, is it too quiet in here?" He's kinda pissed at himself for even asking, but times like this, he wishes Sam snored. Or at least, more often than he does, anyway.
"Dean, that's how people sleep," Sam says in his best 'I know everything' tone. Dean scoffs, grabs one of the extra throw pillows by his side and chucks it at the faint outline of Sam.
Sam 'oofs' and rolls onto his side. Dean can't see it, of course, but he can easily feel Sam's glare hot on his face.
"It's just. I can't sleep without highway noise," Dean lies. "I've grown accustomed to all that honking and gravel and--"
"Dean, one, it's not any more quiet here than anywhere else we've ever stayed over the years, and two, you've never mentioned anything like this before."
"Forget it," Dean says, turns his face away from Sam. Somewhere in front of him is the wall, and he wonders if he reaches his hand out he'll feel it.
And then he wonders if it will be slippery with blood, and if he turns back, if Sam will be gone, just a product of fevered, tortured imagination.
Sam makes a little aborted noise, and Dean's snapped back to this reality, this construct that is supposed to be genuinely happening. He only hopes it's not another mirage played on his eyelids for effect.
"Turn the TV on low if it bothers you that much," Sam says. "And then, dude, go to sleep. I wanna get some actual rest while there's no case for us to be rushing off to."
"Sammy, I can't -- d'you ever think about what Yellow-Eyes's plan was?" Dean's not sure what causes him to bring it up, but he can't help but grapple with shadows, hands splayed in the darkness, trying to grasp at nothing. His brain is cob-webbed and fogged over with grime, like he's not sure any more what he's thinking or even where he is.
"What the--" Sam shifts against the sheets again. Dean finds himself hanging on every single last rustle, every little whistle as the air flows in and out of Sam's lungs. "You think about this often?"
Dean's not about to admit that he worries about Sam and his destiny constantly, about whether there was more to the plan than just grooming a demon leader. He realises guiltily that he never really told Sam about the fact that Azazel had a blueprint for destruction other than simply claiming a debt with some young women, and then feeding their children demon's blood ten years later. This probably isn't the time, either. But Dean's at a point where he'll do anything to keep Sam talking, to keep the silence at bay for just a few minutes longer.
"Y'know, I went back and saw Mom, right? You remember how she was? And Dad? Well, thing is, Castiel told me that -- wait, no, that's not exactly how it happened. I was in 1973, Sammy, and Azazel possessed our grandfather. He did a lot of posturing -- and Sam, why do the bad guys always do that? -- and talked about, well, his 'endgame'. And then when I got back, Castiel said none of the angels knew what it was."
"Dean," Sam mumbles sleepily into his pillow, "I knew that already."
"What do you mean?" Dean sounds wide awake even to his own ears.
"It was obvious Azazel was planning something, Dean. The only question is what."
"Not just the American Idol of special psychic children," Dean says with a sneer. "I meant, something other than that. Something bigger than just propagating his blood all over the place."
"That makes sense," Sam says, sounding half-asleep again. Dean raises his arm, tries to pick out which shadow is his hand in front of his face.
"Sammy, this is fucked. Lilith's off doing who the fuck knows what, and we're just lying around doing nothing. And -- what if that wasn't the end of it, Sam? All of these fits you keep having, all of that shit that's going down, how do we know Yellow-Eyes didn't do something more nefarious than just breed a bunch of psychic kids?"
There's no response from the other bed, and Dean's resigned to the silence now, closes his eyes again, ignores the sparkle of firelight on the inside of his lids, rubs his fingers over his lips and tries to shut out the deafening quiet.
He's actually almost asleep when deafening quiet morphs into deafening noise, and his eyes shoot open in time to see the glitter and flash of glass as it shatters and cascades through the air, and when he looks over at Sam, his brother is sitting straight up in bed, one hand on the side of his face, hiding his expression from Dean.
It's nearly dawn, so Dean can see into the greyness now, and the window curtains are flapping angrily in a breeze that wasn't there five minutes ago, and there's glass scattered all over the floor, indicating that something just blew out the windows.
"Dude, what the fuck was that?" Dean says, and gets out of bed. He shoves his feet into his boots and walks over to the window, crouching down and examining the glass for a second before looking up at the window frame. There's not a speck of glass left in it, which is unusual.
"I uh, have no idea," Sam says, but he sounds unsure, like either he was sound asleep and startled by the noise, or he's not telling Dean something.
Dean really hopes it's not the latter.
"Man, the motel is gonna have our ass," Dean says, shaking his head. Standing up, he sits down heavily on the edge of Sam's bed. This close he can smell the musk of old sweat and sleepy skin, which is an achingly familiar smell, one he was tormented with incessantly in Hell, constantly reminded of Sam and the things he would never have again.
"We better tape it up," Sam says sleepily. "It's gonna get awful cold in here if we don't, and, Dean, it's too early to get up."
"I'll do it," Dean says. "Go back to sleep, Sam."
By the time Dean's done, the sun has started to rise and he's cross-legged on his own bed, fully dressed and watching the light creep through the cracks. Sammy's still asleep, hair sticking out fluffy from under the covers, and Dean wants to watch him, just sit and pretend like the world isn't ending, like they're not fighting for their very lives and everyone else's.
And then Sam has the seizure.
Dean's seen them before, generally on TV, but once or twice in their travels he's seen real people suffering from one too, and so he recognises it instantly, although that doesn't ameliorate the sense of panic that pervades him from his skull down to his toes.
Sam's body jerks, like a puppet with its strings being manipulated every which way, and his eyelids flutter, and his back bows off the bed over and over, and Dean's helpless, not sure whether to call nine-one-one or just keep reaching for Sam; whether to panic to the point of uselessness or try to remain in command of his faculties so that he can do something, except there's nothing to be done, nothing except watch Sam pant and writhe and move like his muscles have been torn and restrung incorrectly.
And then Sam groans, endless, and claws at his skull, fingernails leaving bloody streaks along his temples, the seizure receding and being replaced by the type of agony Dean hasn't ever witnessed in someone living. The last time he saw someone claw bloody ribbons into their skin, he was holding the leather lash and standing at the rack.
Dean ruthlessly buries those memories, because this is different, this is Sam, and Sammy's in pain, and John charged Dean with keeping Sam safe, with alleviating whatever pain he ever could and trying to shoulder the rest of it himself.
He throws himself across Sam's broad chest, almost not strong enough to restrain his brother, who has a good forty pounds on him and all of it muscle. He traps Sam's wrists, one in each hand, and rides out the spell or whatever the fuck it is, forcing Sam to be still even as he bucks restlessly beneath Dean, moaning and crying out in pain.
Dean's got no fucking clue what's going on, just that ever since the seals started breaking Sam's been suddenly deteriorating into these fits of anguish, physical pain that seems so severe Sam can barely breathe, yet every time it's over, Sam refuses to talk about it.
Then again, Dean's been refusing to talk about a lot of things himself, so maybe that's not unreasonable. Blood is oozing from multiple scratches on his head, and Sam's still struggling, breath hot and wet on Dean's cheek, as Dean continues to use his own weight to hold Sam down.
And then it's over, and Sam lets out a breath, falls limp against the bed. Dean lets go of his wrists and climbs off his brother, fetching the first aid kit and beginning to dress the marks on Sam's forehead even as his little brother's breathing evens out.
"I don't know," Sam says in answer to Dean's unspoken, burning question. "I don't know."
"Have you ever had pain like that before?" Dean asks, hopes the answer is 'no', is immediately devastated by Sam's response.
"Only when you were dead," Sam says woodenly. Dean doesn't think he means to make Dean feel like the scum that scum consider lower than scum, but it has that effect just the same. It reminds Dean that even though he was suffering in Hell, Sammy was suffering too, and there's really nothing in Hell or on Earth that can make him feel worse than that.
"Sammy, what's going on? Seems like--"
"I'm sorry, Dean," Sam says, eyes flying open. "God, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that."
"Yes, you did," Dean says, propelling the conversation forward. "Never mind, Sam. Just, we gotta figure out what's going on."
"I called Bobby," Sam says, head falling back against the pillow. "Called him the last time it happened, and he said I was a moron, that that was nothing new, and that he would look into it. I don't think he ever figured out what it was."
"Did he have any leads about what seals Lilith might break next?" Dean puts down the antibiotic ointment, shoves strands of Sam's hair away from the wounds.
"No idea, but I think it's a pretty safe bet she's bringing forth the Horsemen. She's probably not going to abandon that objective, Dean, and I hate to see what happens when she raises Death. You don't argue with Death, Dean. You just die."
"Then we better keep her from breaking that seal, that's for damn sure," Dean says, getting up and putting the first aid kit away. Sam sits up, and even though there's fine lines written on his forehead from the pain, he doesn't look like he's suffering any more.
"It would help if we had some idea how," Sam points out. "Should probably call Bobby again and ask him if he knows what type of ritual is required to break that seal, and if he knows any way we can stop it."
"Well, one thing is for sure," Dean says. "We have to check out of this motel and find a new one, preferably before they figure out we destroyed the glass in their windows. Or that you got blood on their pillows."
"Yeah," Sam agrees. "Fuck, now I can't shower," he says, when he realises it will wash away the ointment. "Thanks, Dean," he adds as an afterthought.
"Well, sharing quarters with a stinky little brother, what else is new?" Dean comments, and stretches, arms over his head. "I'm gonna shower at least. Turn the news on, Sam, see if there's any weird goings-on anywhere, you know, the usual sweep for unusual phenomena."
"You got it," Sam says, and throws his covers back. His body is strangely mottled red in places, chest covered with what almost looks like hand prints, but that's crazy.
Yet when Dean takes off his own shirt and moves to climb into the shower, his own skin is reddened all over. He has no idea what that means, or if it even means anything at all, but dollars to doughnuts it has something to do with a seal.
Dean hopes it's just the sign of imminent breakage and not an indication that the seal gave way with no warning.
By the time he finishes up shaving and throwing some clean clothes on, the marks are gone and Sam's tapping away at the laptop keyboard when he gets out of the bathroom.
"Find anything, Sammy?" Dean asks, towelling dry his hair. It's all artful spikes again when he's finished.
"Nothing so far on the news, but there's something -- Dean, I've been looking into this for awhile, and I didn't wanna say anything unless it seemed strictly necessary, but the more research I do, the more I think it is."
"Dude, spit out. What?"
"Pestilence, Dean. It's not something we can trifle with. I'm pretty sure that once you catch the disease, that's it, you're dead."
"Well, that's encouraging," Dean remarks. "Anything else, Einstein?"
"Yeah, well, I didn't tell you what else Bobby said. He said that demons -- even their host bodies -- are immune to pestilence. He pointed out that I didn't catch that demon virus, and that maybe I'd be lucky enough to be immune to the effects of this demon. But -- but not you, Dean."
"What's your point, princess?" Dean asks, poking at his lips in the mirror. They're chapped, and that's been annoying him all morning. "Do we have any chapstick, Sam?"
"In my duffel, in the side pocket," Sam says. Dean heads over to Sam's bed, unzips the side pocket.
"Figures you'd want your lips soft and kissable," Dean says, "seeing as you never get any."
"Could you focus, Dean, please?" Sam turns the laptop in Dean's direction. "Bobby suggested that -- well, it's a long shot, but we have to try everything."
"Dude, Sam, seriously, just blurt it out. Stop fucking around the bush."
"It's my demon blood, Dean. And -- and I ought to be able to pass that, like a disease. If -- if I do what Azazel did, I can infect someone else with it."
Dean gives Sam his full attention at that, eyebrow going up as high as it can. "Are you saying -- dude, are you suggesting I drink your blood?"
Sam lowers his eyes and shrugs. "You don't wanna catch this, Dean, trust me."
"Last resort," Dean says stridently. "We are not doing that unless it seems like there's nothing else to do."
"It's just a little blood, Dean, and Bobby's pretty sure that while it will transfer the immunity, it won't do anything else because I'm not actually a demon."
"Pretty sure? I'm gonna need--"
"Really pretty sure," Sam says, and Dean walks over, thwacks him upside the head.
"Cute, Sam, real cute."
"Well, we won't do it unless that seal actually breaks, Dean, don't worry." Sam snaps the laptop lid closed. "C'mon, let's pack up, shag ass, and get some breakfast on our way to the next town. I didn't see anything that looks like omens, and up until that oddness last night, I haven't sensed Lilith being up to anything, either."
"Sam..." Dean stuffs the last of his dirty clothes into the canvas bag. "Can you -- can you read minds?"
"No," Sam says, almost a little too quickly. "No, that would be weird. It's more of a vibe I get from demons, that's all."
"Good, keep it that way," Dean says. He lifts up his duffel and looks meaningfully at Sam's unmade bed. "Get a move on."
"I'm already packed," Sam replies. "I put my bag in the trunk already, I just kept the laptop out for investigative purposes."
"God, you're such a freak," Dean says, rolling his eyes. "I wanna get sausage and eggs this morning, Sam, so we need to find a good place to stop. Preferably with some really cute diner waitress."
It's Sam's turn to roll his eyes, and Dean stifles his snicker.
As they turn onto the highway, Dean looks up under the sun visor, realises that there's a strange hue on the horizon, kind of purplish, even though the sun is already completely up.
He brushes it off as nothing, though, concentrating on the Zeppelin in the tape deck and the slight wheeze in Sam's breathing as his brother tries not to complain that this is the sixth time they've listened to this tape in a week.
Dean drives, and Sam stares out the window looking for a place to stop for breakfast, and it's a beautiful day, the type that makes you believe nothing could ever go wrong with the world.
Dean kind of really wishes that were true.
There's a faint tickle at the back of his brain, and it never even occurs to him to wonder what it is.
By the time they stop it's the middle of the morning, and even though the diner looks promising, their waitress is grey-haired and even though she's still attractive, and clearly fond of them both, she doesn't seem inclined to Dean's favourite kind of fun, which is a shame.
"You two make such a cute couple," she gushes as she scribbles their orders on her pad. "You remind me of my nephew."
Sam opens his mouth to correct her and Dean stomps on his foot under the table. They might get free pie if she thinks they're in a relationship with each other.
"Make sure you don't put cream in the coffee, boys," she advises. "It's excellent, amazing without anything added to it."
"I'll be sure to remember that," Dean says, his best trademark smile in place. She melts under the warmth of it, and Dean's pretty sure Sam's making that tight face he gets whenever Dean's being particularly incorrigible.
"And the bacon's fantastic," she says, wheedling, clearly loathe to walk away from their table. This time Sam smiles, dimples out in full force, and she turns to goo under the combined force of their attention. "What happened to your face, honey?" she asks, and Dean shoots a look at Sam, realises that his hair doesn't completely cover the scratches and welts on his forehead.
"Oh, just our cat woke me up this morning. I'll have some bacon, then," Sam says easily, letting a gloss seep into the tenor of his voice, changing the subject before she can get too interested in why the marks look like they've been made by human hands. She actually titters as she walks away, and Dean's kind of disappointed that she's not about twenty years younger.
Sam glares at him from across the table. "Dean, shame on you."
"You love it," Dean replies, arching one eyebrow, quirking his lips so that his own dimples come into play. "There could be free pie, Sammy! I can't turn that down."
"You'd think someday you'd get sick of pie," Sam says, shaking his head. "Fine, but I'm going to remember that the next time you complain about how everyone thinks we're gay."
Dean just grins, and when the waitress brings their food, she really does bring a slice of pie with her.
"On the house," she says. "Stay happy, boys."
Dean shovels the food into his mouth, but out of the corner of his eye something catches his attention, and when he looks up, Sam's eyes have a funny sort of reflective quality. And then, as quickly as it appeared, it's gone.
Sammy doesn't eat much, even though the coffee is just as promised and the bacon smells heavenly even from on Sam's plate. Dean snatches a piece, crunches into it, and closes his eyes in bacon-induced bliss even as Sam's fork clatters down against the table.
"Listen, Dean, I feel kinda sick," Sam says, and Dean opens his eyes. "Like, something's wrong, or something awful is about to happen, I'm not really sure. I think Lilith's active again."
Dean tracks their waitress with his eyes and wonders whether she's hiding black in hers. She was really nice...
"Settle the bill, Dean, I'll meet you in the car," Sam says, and shoves out of the booth.
"I gotta take a leak first," Dean says. "I'll be out in a minute."
He spends a few minutes in the bathroom staring at his reflection and wondering why he, too, suddenly feels kind of nauseous, and when he goes up to the register with the money in his hand, his gaze falls on the television playing behind the counter.
It's showing a hospital that's teeming with people, most of them covered in sores the like of which Dean has never seen before, and well, that cannot be good. There's one close-up that shows marks kind of like the ones he'd seen on himself and Sam earlier that morning, and he throws down the money and dashes out the door, grabbing the handle of the Impala's door and yanking it open.
"Sammy, I think we're too late. I'm pretty sure Pestilence just made itself known."
Sam's kind of grey, looking grave. "Yeah, I heard."
"You -- heard?" Dean gives Sam a funny look. "You were out here."
"On the radio," Sam adds immediately, but when Dean studies him, Sam has that look he used to get when he was little and kept stealing all of the cookies that Dad could barely afford.
"Sam, dude, the car's not on," Dean says slowly. And then, "Yeah, well, it looks pretty messy, and I think we're already fucked, because there coulda been twenty people already sick, who the fuck knows how many more that they didn't show, and if you're right, those people are all gonna die. Unless... Sam, will they still die if we put down the demon like a rabid dog?"
"I don't know, Dean, but I think Lilith just forced our hand. We gotta find a place to stop on the way, anywhere that's got some privacy, because I am not letting you drive into a town besieged by plague without doing everything I can to make sure you're safe."
"Stop stealing my job," Dean says, hoping a little levity will ease up on the gravity of the situation. Sam scowls, though, lips folding down.
"I'm serious, Dean."
"All right, all right," Dean concedes, and starts to drive.
They're at least six hours away from the affected area, and so Dean drives non-stop for five and then finds a motel, gets them a room and follows Sammy inside, latching the door with the 'do not disturb' sign hanging on the outside.
"Is there some kind of ritual to this?" Dean asks, scrubbing a hand through his hair. "Or do I just drink your blood?"
"It's not a ritual per se, but I have to emulate what Azazel did or it won't work, although your guess is as good as mine as to why not. You have to be -- uh, relaxed, like almost asleep. And I have to break the skin on my wrist, and when the blood hits your mouth, you have to swallow at least six drops. Bobby swears that will work."
"Man, this is all kinds of sick," Dean mutters. "I hope you don't have AIDs."
"Dean." Sam sounds utterly disgusted with him. "You know perfectly well I don't. Not that the blood of a demon isn't probably a worse virus, but still."
"This is so second grade," Dean says under his breath as he lies down on the bed, arms crossed behind his head. Sam looms over him, and okay, yeah, Sam can be kinda scary like that, all big and giant wingspan and Dean suddenly feels very, very small and uneasy for no reason he can fathom.
"Just try to relax, Dean," Sam instructs. "It's gonna be pretty quick and painless -- well, at least for you, anyway."
"Just do it already, Sam," Dean says, closing his eyes. The silence stretches between them, and Dean's forcibly and unexpectedly reminded of when they were kids, when they did something just like this, Sammy five years old and Dean nine and filled with glee at the idea of being blood brothers and not quite on the uptake enough to realise that they already were. Sammy'd cried a little, blood dripping down his little fingers, as Dean used his brand-new knife, the one he'd gotten for his birthday, to score a line down Sammy's palm.
And when they'd mixed their blood, hands clasped together, Dean had looked at Sam's lowered eyelashes, little freckles scattered across the lids, and sworn to himself for the umpteenth time that he would never let anything bad happen to his baby brother.
Dean has failed Sam twice now, when Jess flamed away to nothing on the ceiling of Sam's apartment, and when Sam was stabbed in the back by Jake, and he's not going to do it again. No matter what it takes, he's going to keep the vow he made the last time they willingly shared their blood.
And then the first metallic drop hits Dean's lips, and he opens his mouth and his eyes, and the blood is oozing out of a wound on Sam's wrist, clinging to the hairs there and falling through the air to land in a spatter on Dean's mouth, and he licks it off his lips, swallows carefully, counts the droplets until he's ingested six, and then Sam grips his wrist with his other hand and staves off the flow.
It wasn't even the type of wound they'd usually so much as blink at, but Sam's eyelids are lowered and there's sweat standing out on his clammy forehead.
"I think -- I think I need to lie down for about twenty minutes," Sam says, and that right there gives Dean his first indication that maybe the ritual just worked. He doesn't feel any different, but Sammy looks like it took a lot out of him, so he nods against the pillow and remembers how five-year-old Sam had laughed and giggled when Dean had tackled him to the floor, tickling and rubbing his nose into the carpet, their blood still staining their skin.
They'd gotten quite the lecture about that, later, when John came home; an instruction about how to try to keep injuries to a minimum, even if Sam was still too little to know why.
Dean can still taste the copper on his tongue, and he flicks the TV on as Sam sprawls on the bed next to him. They'd taken whatever room was available because they didn't intend to sleep there, which means that now there's only one king-size bed and fuck all if Sam doesn't manage to take up most of it. It's been a long time since they've shared a bed, and Dean's really pretty sure Sam wasn't a Sasquatch back then.
"Wake me up in a few minutes," Sam slurs. "Can't wait too long to get there and take care of things."
But it turns out something wakes them both up an hour later, when the smoke detector goes off and Dean opens stinging eyes to a billow of smoke hurtling across the room towards them.
He looks at Sam, but Sammy's still mostly asleep as the fire begins to spread, and Dean can only hope that whatever caused it, it's not their fault. He's thankful that they didn't unpack the Impala because they'd only planned to stay for a short time, so he hauls Sam to his feet and they make a run for it, peeling out of the parking lot and trying to be appear inconspicuous and as if they didn't just escape a burning motel room without even bothering to call the fire department.
Dean cuts his eyes away from the road and focuses on Sam for a second.
"Hey, Sam, you think you can put out fires too?" he asks, and Sam shrugs one shoulder.
"No idea, never tried," he says. Dean's just about to believe that without question when he thinks back a few months earlier to that first house and the first Horseman-related seal, and the fact that they'd been surrounded until Sam did something and got them out of the house alive and unscathed.
Dean wants to ask Sam about it, to make Sam explain why he would lie, but he's distracted by the car rolling to a stop, all of the lights and electricity going out. They're right outside the afflicted town, and Dean really hopes it's not the demon they're chasing, because he's a little bit apprehensive about how well Sam's little ritual has worked, but then someone walks out of the twilight, arms crossed in a familiar manner, and Dean's head hits the back of the seat with a thunk.
"Ruby," he groans, and gets out of the car. She looks Dean up and down, then stares at Sam for a long moment, before facing them both.
"Smart," she says. "Which one of you primates actually thought of that?"
"Bobby," Sam says, head a little bit lowered.
"Ah, I should have known," she remarks. "Well, it took, anyway. I mean, as best as I can tell, at least you two boys should be safe walking into town like avenging angels."
"Funny," Sam says dryly. "You know I'm the furthest thing from an angel there is." And Ruby looks suddenly calculating.
"I wouldn't say that," she says, then directs her gaze to Dean. "Try not to drop dead of the plague, because Sam is a useless pile of misery when you're gone."
"Thanks for that, Ruby," Dean says sarcastically. "I'm so glad you're concerned with his welfare. Or mine, for that matter."
"If I weren't," she starts, "I wouldn't be here right now to make sure you two don't fuck up and die. Either way, I think you'll be all right. Have a nice vacation, boys."
She's gone before Dean can retort, and Sam trades a glance with Dean.
"Guess that means the ritual worked," Sam says a little weakly. "I don't know about you, but I'm still not crazy about walking directly into a hotbed of disease and pestilence."
"What other choice do we have?" Dean asks, slides back into the car and slams the door shut, Sam doing likewise.
"I wish we could phone in an exorcism," Sam says mournfully.
"Ha, that'd be funny, y'know," Dean says with a bark of slightly black laughter. "If we put a megaphone on the Impala and just drove across the country blaring the exorcism ritual."
"It might even work," Sam says grudgingly. "Anyhow, might as well get this show on the road."
"Any idea who the demon might be possessing?" Dean asks as he starts up the Impala again. Sam settles back against the leather seat next to Dean.
"It's gotta be someone who can easily transmit disease," Sam says thoughtfully. "I hate to say it, but probably a little kid. And probably a little kid that was around all of the people who immediately got sick without actually getting sick himself or herself."
"Great. A kid. Oh man, I love when we have to do evil and unspeakable things to children, because no matter what good it is for humanity, inevitably someone's pissed."
"Well, Dean, you know as well as I do we don't do this job to make fans. We do it to protect people, and sometimes that means alienating them."
"Thank you, Dr. Phil," Dean shoots back. "So, fire up the laptop, research-boy, and try to find out who got sick first, and where, and who was lucky enough not to catch it."
Sam pulls the laptop out of its case and opens the lid, switches it on. The drive is a short one, and by the time they pull into the hospital parking lot, Sam has an answer. Not that he doesn't always have an answer, but some of them are more useful than others.
"Demon's got a sense of humour," Sam mumbles at last. "I figure it's gotta be this kid, because if nothing else, it's too ironic not to be the case."
"Yeah?" Dean takes the ticket and drives down into the parking garage.
"Yeah, a five-year-old named Mercy Collins was with a group of little kids in day care. Every last one of them got sick within hours, except her."
"Sounds like a demon's sick sense of humour all right," Dean agrees. "So. One of us is gonna have to kidnap that girl and--"
"No. No, Dean, I hate to say it, but I don't see any other option. You're going to have to distract whoever while I--"
"Sam, we've had this argument before, the answer's always been no, the answer's gonna stay no, I'm not risking--"
"Dean, stop." Sam puts the computer to sleep and shoves it back in its bag. "This is not the time to rehash this again. I haven't seen head nor tail feather of Uriel in months, which means I'm doing something right, even if the angels don't like it."
"Well, dude, we're gonna need a huge distraction, I think, because I'm pretty sure our demon isn't going to be exactly subtle, and it's bad enough that there is a sudden inexplicable deadly disease in this town."
Sam extends his legs as far as he can in the cramped front seat of the Impala, laptop bag crammed between his thighs. Dean shakes his head a little. The Chevy is a huge car, but against that freak of nature, it never had a chance.
"Sure, whatever, Dean. We just gotta find this kid and--"
"If you were five years old, Sam -- and I mean physically, not emotionally -- and you were the only one of your playmates not to get sick, where do you think you'd be?"
"Probably in my backyard playing on the swings," Sam says, ignoring Dean's jibe.
"Yahtzee. Does it say where she lives?"
"No, not precisely, but it did say her mother was head of the hospital."
"It say where the mother lives?"
"Downtown," Sam says. "But then again, maybe she's here, anyway."
Dean sighs heavily. "Do you sense any demons nearby?"
"No, but I think we probably have bigger fish to fry."
"Why's that?" Dean turns the key and the Impala growls to a halt.
"Because, if I were a demon intent on making everyone sick in a wider and wider radius, I'd be sneaking away from home right about now, and--"
"Oh, fuck," Dean curses. "You know, Sam, I just paid for parking and we don't even need to be here."
"That's sadly true," Sam says. "And we're running low on cash again, Dean, you need to buy less booze and more food until we can hustle some more poker."
"Unfortunately, that has to take a back seat to hunting demons for the moment," Dean says, and wheels the car back out of the parking space. He grimaces when he hands over the ten bucks for parking, and then they're flying down the highway, trying not to call too much attention to themselves as they keep their eyes peeled for a five-year-old without any accompanying guardian.
It's about when the radio broadcast shivers in and out and the headlights flicker that Dean feels every sense kick into high gear.
She's found them, it turns out, appropriating Ruby's little car-stopping trick and causing the Impala to thunder to a stop on the shoulder.
Sam jumps out of the car, and Dean's only a step behind, but he doesn't get very far before once again he's held immobile by invisible bonds against his body, this time pressed to the sleek black metal of his baby.
"Aw, how sweet," she says, and for a split second Dean wonders if this is actually Lilith, 'cause the kid is tiny and blonde and far too adorable-looking to be inhabited by a profane spirit. "Shame you two found me, isn't it? Because now you're both going to get sick and die."
"I don't think so," Dean says through gritted teeth. Sam's loose-limbed, relaxed, like he's not worried in the least.
"My brother's right," he says. "I don't know how long it's been since you've been top side, but things have changed, sweetheart. Nowadays, there are those of us who know just how to handle a filthy boil on humanity's backside like you."
"Oh, you've hurt my feelings," she says, clutching at her heart. Sam smiles, a wicked curve of intent.
"But you like boils, don't you? Like spreading disease and foulness?"
The little girl starts to walk closer, and Sam holds out his hand. She comes to a screeching halt, literally, her lung-power piercing right through Dean's eardrums. But no matter how she strains, she can't make headway against Sam's outstretched hand.
Dean wonders briefly if this is part of Sam's hand of doom-for-demons, or if this is something new. Sam smiles lazily again.
"I think you're about to find yourself back in Hell," he says, and she spits at him.
Dean wishes he could move, and is more than a little thankful that he doesn't feel like he's getting ill.
"I don't think so, puny human, I think--" and then she stops, stares hard. "Holy fuck," she says, and Dean's eyes widen, unused to language like that from a child, even in his line of work.
"That's right," Sam says, and his eyes slit closed a little. She begins to cough, to lean forward, and Dean realises that Sam is much stronger than he used to be, because his nose doesn't bleed and he doesn't reach for his head as the black smoke belches from her mouth.
Dean feels the invisible straps against his body fall away, and Sam lowers his hand. The little girl starts to cry, looking around frantically.
"It's okay, sweetie," Sam says in his most soothing tone, crouching down to her level. "Really. We'll take you to your mom, okay? Try not to be alarmed."
"I wa--was so sc--scared," she stutters, throwing chubby little arms around Sam's neck. "I don't know what happened to me."
"It's best if you forget about it altogether," Sam says gently. "I promise you, you'll be happier that way." He gets to his feet with her still clinging to him, and deposits her into the back seat of the Impala. Dean gets back in, straps himself in, and gives Sam a sidelong look. No matter what Sam says, this kid is going to be haunted by this forever.
And then, as Dean makes a U-turn and blends back into traffic, the little girl starts to laugh.
It seems odd to Dean, but he's quickly and irrevocably distracted by the radio announcing a miraculous, almost instantaneous recovery of everyone who'd been sick, and sighs in relief.
They drop Mercy off with her mother, explaining they found her wandering confused along the freeway, and the woman gives them a dirty look but accepts her daughter, waving them off.
Dean drives them to a motel in town and stops the car, looking over at Sam.
"Death is next," he says. "I don't think we can pretend any more that Lilith isn't going to break that seal just as easy as snapping apart a Kit-Kat, Sammy."
"Yeah. I know," Sam says. He sounds defeated. "I really thought -- I mean, I thought we had a chance. I thought for sure there was something we could do, or the angels wouldn't have saved you, wouldn't've cared one way or the other because they would've already known it was a lost cause."
"So, here's the thing, Sam: I think we better gear up to face Lucifer. Better be prepared, because it's gonna happen, and you and I have gotta be ready."
Famous last words.
When Dean was nine years old, Sammy caught the chicken pox. It was only a few weeks after they'd bled on each other, and it was horribly frustrating, because little Sam wouldn't stop crying and itching his sores, which made John just as sore towards them both.
Dean didn't remember having the chicken pox himself, although he must have, and when he asked John, his father hedged and said that it had been way back when Dean was four, and that meant -- well, that meant that his mother had probably taken care of him when he was sick.
That made Dean feel even more sorry for Sammy, because his baby brother didn't have a mother, never had, and the closest thing he had now was his big brother. When John went out that night, telling Dean he'd be back by morning, Dean had run the bath with the oatmeal stuff in it, told Sammy not to eat it, and plunked his little brother in the water.
Sam had splashed them both, and despite instruction, some of the water went into his mouth anyway, but he made a face and spit it back out, laughing even with tear tracks still drying on his cheeks. Dean kept grabbing little chubby fingers and pulling them away from Sam's chicken pox, and when he got Sam out of the bath, Dean was so proud of himself.
Maybe Sam had never known his mother, but he had Dean, and there was nothing Dean wouldn't do for Sammy.
He dressed Sam in his blue fuzzy blanket sleeper with Cookie Monster on it and tucked him into bed, snuggling up next to him even though he was really too old, and watched Sam suck his thumb as he drifted off.
Sam wasn't sick for long, but Dean never forgot what it was like to take care of his little brother, and even though Sam was rarely sick again growing up, Dean filed away the information just in case.
There was nothing Dean wouldn't do for Sammy, whether it be giving his life or draining every last drop of his blood to protect him.
