Kurda was in Africa when he got the call from Dean. He'd been living in Ghana for a year or so, teaching evening classes to those unable to afford further education but who were hungry to learn. He listened to Dean's words and didn't bother to reply, knowing that Dean wasn't the kind of person to stay on the phone and discuss feelings, but he kept the receiver pressed close to his ear for several minutes after the call, listening to the low pitched beep, numb with grief.
Sam had been Kurda's friend almost from the start - they connected on a personal level, sharing similar interests and opinions. They'd often worked together to wind Dean up, purposefully being as 'dorky' as possible in front of him because they knew it got on his nerves. Kurda had shared all of his research with Sam and the younger Winchester had always been awed by the stories the blonde vampire brought back from his travels.
Kurda felt terrible. It was as though someone had hit him in the stomach with something cold and heavy and blunt.
Sam was gone.
Kwame, Kurda's teaching assistant, noticed that something wasn't right and looked at him questioningly. "I need to go," Kurda said, numbly. Kwame nodded and promised to take Kurda's class for as long as he needed.
The vampire went to his apartment and packed his things in silence. Kwame pulled up outside in the jeep shortly afterwards and drove him to the airport. It wasn't until Kurda was on the flight from Accra to Lawrence that everything caught up with him and he rested his head against the window and let the tears silently fall.
It was a thirteen hour flight, but the first thing Kurda did when he got off of it was to try to call Dean. He wasn't sure if he'd pick up, and if he did he wasn't sure that he'd tell him where he was. Kurda had gotten to know Dean pretty well over the years and had realised rather quickly that Dean was a runner - he ran from his problems, his feelings, and anything he couldn't take down with a shotgun or holy water.
He'd caught him in between the many, many hunts, while he was pouring over a map to decide which state to hit next. He let the phone ring inside the compartment. And ring. And ring. And then he opens the compartment, and checks the caller ID.
goddamn it He hadn't meant for him to call back. At least, that's what he's telling himself. He's not just running physically but mentally, too. And if there's anything that can be said about a life bathed in blood, it's that you learn how to shut off. mostly. channel everything else into cold, hard anger which lets you hunt and kill to feel angrier, and it's a whole spiralling, self-destructive mess. One he's well down the path on.
He answers just before the machine picks it up, ice sitting in his voice because he's refusing to let himself feel anything else. but behind the cold wall if the restained grief, ringing empty.
coping? what's that?
"If it's not a hunt, I ain't interested." Not even a hello. That's real nice.
"I just flew halfway around the world to be here," Kurda said, quickly, "Don't you dare say you won't see me Dean Winchester. I'm in Lawrence, where are you?"
Kurda was using his 'no nonsense' tone as he stood in line to get a cab. He had to be the strong one for Dean now, he couldn't get emotional, he had to be hard because it was the only way of getting through to the other man when he was like this.
He recieves a snarl from Dean's end of the line. "I'll say what I damned well want." He's not going to apologise for that, either. Not for the snarl, not for the being rude.
He's pushing. Pushing away from what he cares about because that leaves room for emotion. for the grief to settle back in and turn him inside out. "I didn't ask you to come back."
west. go west. Haven't been that way since... haven't been that way yet. His eyes track the nearest interstate on the map and follow it to the first town over the state line. "Call me back with a hunt or don't call back at all. How's that one sound?"
"I'm going to find you, Dean," Kurda didn't sound annoyed, but his words were a promise not a threat. He hung up before Dean had a chance to and then got into a taxi. He drove to the nearest rental place, picked up a '96 Harley Davidson Heritage, then hit the road.
Kurda spent months looking for Dean - he worked cases, searching the newspapers and the internet for potentially supernatural disturbances, knowing that Dean would be doing the same thing. Eventually they would run into each other, they had to, even if it took years. Meanwhile Kurda was helping people, and he'd picked up enough from Sam and Dean over the years to have become a more than competent hunter in his own right. As it turned out it thankfully did not take years, and one unusually stormy night in Knoxville, Tennessee Kurda found his old friend once more.
He should have skipped out as soon as he smelt Kurda in town. He knew it. but he'd never left a hunt unfinished knowingly, and he wasn't about to start now. Ove the months he'd gathered more hard lines to the edges of his already solid frame, more than a few extra scars, and a lethal brutality on the hunts he did. The kind that said 'I'm pissed with the world and I'm taking it out on this.'
He'd managed to catch the demon that was causing the nearby omens - the unusual storm being just one of them - by surprise, coming up on her from behind in an empty alleyway. He snagged her on the way from her latest victim, putting his hand over her mouth to stop her jumping ship. ruby's kinfe came out and drew across the throat slowly, much slower than necessary, as he locked eyes on his friend who had also turned out to be tracking the same demon. He dropped the body after it flashed when the demon was killed, and he dropped the body. It had been a dead meatsuit anyway. He could smell it, the dead blood. not that he distinguished anymore - a demon was a demon and a demon was evil.
"You've seen me, I'm fine, you can screw off now." but even just looking at Kurda, he could feel the precipice of the grief he shut himself off from. Rolling his eyes at him and sam geeking over some piece of new lore, sharing stories over a beer, or even just him and Kurda hitting a bar together and going out for a laugh. Making fun of his more... eccentric clothes. He snappped himself off from the memories. Don't get lost in the past. Drag yourself through the endless future. Damn you, Sam.
Kurda didn't look at the felled body because it upset him, even if it was just a demon in a corpse. He looked directly at Dean and kept his gaze hard and sturdy. "Do you think Sam would have wanted you acting like this?" He went straight in for the kill before Dean had a chance to run off or make excuses. "You're a sight for sore eyes, Dean Winchester, and you need to stop."
Kurda was thoroughly prepared to make Dean stop, even if it meant throwing him over his shoulder and physically dragging him off to somewhere he couldn't run from.
Not what sam would want? That was almost laughable. It's sam's fault he's doing this in the first place. Because he's nestled the barrel of The Colt so the last bullet in the gun would go right through the brainstem, stood in front of the latest hunter that's tracked him completely unarmed, and at the end of the day, he's never been able to follow through because he remembers the weak grip and the pleading eyes, begging him to live.
Newsflash, Sammy: I don't want to. I can't. I don't know how.
"stop?" He can't stop. because if he keeps moving, they can't get him. The thoughts, the memories, the lonliness. "Not going to happen. You can try and make me though." Despite the defiance in the tone, the cocky front and set jaw, it's in the way he holds his hands, the look that's creeped into his eye. Do it.
Kurda sighed. "Very well." There was no question that Dean was stronger than Kurda, but the blonde made up for it by being a lot faster. He was practically a blur as he lurched forward and made a grab for Dean, twisting the knife easily out of his grip and getting a firm hold on him with his arms pinned behind his back. As Dean struggled against him Kurda rested his forehead on the hunter's shoulder and shushed him calmly. "Shh.... I'll miss him too, Dean..." and as he said it the tears ran slowly down his cheeks and dripped unchecked onto the other man's jacket.
He did struggle. He struggled like a cat being pushed towards a body of water. But it was no good, and Kurda had a hold of him too well.
The moment he gives in is all too clear. He just crumples under the weight of the Void Of Sam, being driven to his knees and taking Kurda right down with him. A choked sob tears from his throat as the tears truely start, a wordless sound trying to convey a grief that's threatening to crush him. HAS crushed him.
After his emotional storm has passed, and he's down to slient tears and shaking, he speaks. It's hoarse and quiet. Almost sounding... broken. "I hate him for it. Leaving and making me live. I can't."
Kurda supported Dean as he crumpled so he didn't hit the ground too hard, then he hugged him so close... He held him pressed against himself like he might somehow be able to absorb his pain, to draw the hurt out like a poison. He clung to him and let him cry, he cried along with him, and when Dean spoke it made Kurda's heart physically ache. He wasn't sad for the loss of Sam anymore, he was sad for the loss of Dean.
"...You can... you will... you're going to get through this and I'm going to help you." Kurda promised. He cradled Dean in his arms, moving to a sitting position, and then he rocked the man gently like he was an infant. "It's going to hurt, it will hurt for a long time, I won't lie to you... but it will get better and you'll be alright... we'll be alright..."
Kurda was never going to give up on Dean, not ever. He remembered when he got back from the Lake of Souls, the mess he'd been in, and the way Sam and Dean had never given up on him - they'd put him back together piece by piece and then filled in the cracks and now Kurda was going to do that for Dean or die trying.
When Kurda had got back from the lake of souls, the pieces had been kind-of there to work with, though, This was... well, he'd have more of himself left if you went and ripped his limbs off, and possibly some of his chest too. Or, that's how he felt.
"No. I- I can't. I.. don't... know... how." At the near silent admission, the tears have seemed to stop, but he makes no move to dry his face with a hand or anything. I won't be alright. I'm staring down the business end of forever with out him. I can't bring him back - even if my soul was worth anything, he died old and naturally - and I can't even get to see him on the other side." And it's not like... he expects Kurda to stay with his ass all the time, or not and up dead somehow too. So... he's left with this.
This.
This is what he was afraid of most. Is his hell, far more effective than being peeled apart layer by layer.
But what Dean didn't understand was that Kurda would stay with him. He'd stay with him for eternity if that's what it took.
"There's nothing I can say to make this better for you," Kurda admitted, "There aren't any magic words to make it stop hurting, and I don't have a magic wand to bring him back... But I'm your friend and I'm here, I'm here for as long as you need me and whatever it is you need to do to get through this I'm going to help you. I'm no replacement for your brother, Dean, but you're not alone."
He heaves a shuddering breath, before he admits quietly, "...it feels like it. This feels like... everything I'd always done, sam was in the plans somehow. with the exception being... '09. But even then, I still looked..." He shakes his head, trying to get some order to what he's saying.
"What I mean is... this is alone. You can't stay here forever. And I can't ask you to do that. So this is alone. and... there's only one thing I know how to do when alone." At that, his gaze moves from the floor to the dead host on the floor. Hunt. Kill. Make things suffer instead of him, and shift the pain. Run away from it all.
"You don't need to ask," Kurda replied, "I'm staying. You won't get rid of me now. You think I enjoy being on my own all of the time?... Eternity is a bloody long time, Dean. But I won't let you close everything out and become a machine, that's not going to happen. I promised Sam I'd look after you and I'm going to whether you like it or not."
Kurda wiped his eyes and finally let go of Dean. He took a deep, shuddering breath, banished the last of his sobs, then stood up.
"Now get up and stop acting like you're the only person who's ever lost someone close to them. You're going to get on the bike and we're going to get a pizza."
Despite himself, despite the fact that he didn't feel like he'd clawed his way up even a fraction of the wall of the dark pit he'd fallen into, he cracks a ghost of a smile before starting to move. It was brief, it was hollow, but it was there.
"....If we're going to eat...." He starts hesitantly "...I'm going to need... food food." Besides, he really doesn't think he could stomach anything solid at the minute anyway.
He listened to Dean's words and didn't bother to reply, knowing that Dean wasn't the kind of person to stay on the phone and discuss feelings, but he kept the receiver pressed close to his ear for several minutes after the call, listening to the low pitched beep, numb with grief.
Sam had been Kurda's friend almost from the start - they connected on a personal level, sharing similar interests and opinions. They'd often worked together to wind Dean up, purposefully being as 'dorky' as possible in front of him because they knew it got on his nerves. Kurda had shared all of his research with Sam and the younger Winchester had always been awed by the stories the blonde vampire brought back from his travels.
Kurda felt terrible. It was as though someone had hit him in the stomach with something cold and heavy and blunt.
Sam was gone.
Kwame, Kurda's teaching assistant, noticed that something wasn't right and looked at him questioningly.
"I need to go," Kurda said, numbly. Kwame nodded and promised to take Kurda's class for as long as he needed.
The vampire went to his apartment and packed his things in silence. Kwame pulled up outside in the jeep shortly afterwards and drove him to the airport. It wasn't until Kurda was on the flight from Accra to Lawrence that everything caught up with him and he rested his head against the window and let the tears silently fall.
It was a thirteen hour flight, but the first thing Kurda did when he got off of it was to try to call Dean. He wasn't sure if he'd pick up, and if he did he wasn't sure that he'd tell him where he was. Kurda had gotten to know Dean pretty well over the years and had realised rather quickly that Dean was a runner - he ran from his problems, his feelings, and anything he couldn't take down with a shotgun or holy water.
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goddamn it He hadn't meant for him to call back. At least, that's what he's telling himself. He's not just running physically but mentally, too. And if there's anything that can be said about a life bathed in blood, it's that you learn how to shut off. mostly. channel everything else into cold, hard anger which lets you hunt and kill to feel angrier, and it's a whole spiralling, self-destructive mess. One he's well down the path on.
He answers just before the machine picks it up, ice sitting in his voice because he's refusing to let himself feel anything else. but behind the cold wall if the restained grief, ringing empty.
coping? what's that?
"If it's not a hunt, I ain't interested." Not even a hello. That's real nice.
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Kurda was using his 'no nonsense' tone as he stood in line to get a cab. He had to be the strong one for Dean now, he couldn't get emotional, he had to be hard because it was the only way of getting through to the other man when he was like this.
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He's pushing. Pushing away from what he cares about because that leaves room for emotion. for the grief to settle back in and turn him inside out. "I didn't ask you to come back."
west. go west. Haven't been that way since... haven't been that way yet. His eyes track the nearest interstate on the map and follow it to the first town over the state line. "Call me back with a hunt or don't call back at all. How's that one sound?"
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He drove to the nearest rental place, picked up a '96 Harley Davidson Heritage, then hit the road.
Kurda spent months looking for Dean - he worked cases, searching the newspapers and the internet for potentially supernatural disturbances, knowing that Dean would be doing the same thing. Eventually they would run into each other, they had to, even if it took years. Meanwhile Kurda was helping people, and he'd picked up enough from Sam and Dean over the years to have become a more than competent hunter in his own right.
As it turned out it thankfully did not take years, and one unusually stormy night in Knoxville, Tennessee Kurda found his old friend once more.
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He'd managed to catch the demon that was causing the nearby omens - the unusual storm being just one of them - by surprise, coming up on her from behind in an empty alleyway. He snagged her on the way from her latest victim, putting his hand over her mouth to stop her jumping ship. ruby's kinfe came out and drew across the throat slowly, much slower than necessary, as he locked eyes on his friend who had also turned out to be tracking the same demon. He dropped the body after it flashed when the demon was killed, and he dropped the body. It had been a dead meatsuit anyway. He could smell it, the dead blood. not that he distinguished anymore - a demon was a demon and a demon was evil.
"You've seen me, I'm fine, you can screw off now." but even just looking at Kurda, he could feel the precipice of the grief he shut himself off from. Rolling his eyes at him and sam geeking over some piece of new lore, sharing stories over a beer, or even just him and Kurda hitting a bar together and going out for a laugh. Making fun of his more... eccentric clothes. He snappped himself off from the memories. Don't get lost in the past. Drag yourself through the endless future. Damn you, Sam.
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"Do you think Sam would have wanted you acting like this?" He went straight in for the kill before Dean had a chance to run off or make excuses. "You're a sight for sore eyes, Dean Winchester, and you need to stop."
Kurda was thoroughly prepared to make Dean stop, even if it meant throwing him over his shoulder and physically dragging him off to somewhere he couldn't run from.
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Newsflash, Sammy: I don't want to. I can't. I don't know how.
"stop?" He can't stop. because if he keeps moving, they can't get him. The thoughts, the memories, the lonliness. "Not going to happen. You can try and make me though." Despite the defiance in the tone, the cocky front and set jaw, it's in the way he holds his hands, the look that's creeped into his eye. Do it.
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"Very well."
There was no question that Dean was stronger than Kurda, but the blonde made up for it by being a lot faster. He was practically a blur as he lurched forward and made a grab for Dean, twisting the knife easily out of his grip and getting a firm hold on him with his arms pinned behind his back. As Dean struggled against him Kurda rested his forehead on the hunter's shoulder and shushed him calmly.
"Shh.... I'll miss him too, Dean..." and as he said it the tears ran slowly down his cheeks and dripped unchecked onto the other man's jacket.
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The moment he gives in is all too clear. He just crumples under the weight of the Void Of Sam, being driven to his knees and taking Kurda right down with him. A choked sob tears from his throat as the tears truely start, a wordless sound trying to convey a grief that's threatening to crush him. HAS crushed him.
After his emotional storm has passed, and he's down to slient tears and shaking, he speaks. It's hoarse and quiet. Almost sounding... broken. "I hate him for it. Leaving and making me live. I can't."
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He held him pressed against himself like he might somehow be able to absorb his pain, to draw the hurt out like a poison. He clung to him and let him cry, he cried along with him, and when Dean spoke it made Kurda's heart physically ache.
He wasn't sad for the loss of Sam anymore, he was sad for the loss of Dean.
"...You can... you will... you're going to get through this and I'm going to help you." Kurda promised. He cradled Dean in his arms, moving to a sitting position, and then he rocked the man gently like he was an infant. "It's going to hurt, it will hurt for a long time, I won't lie to you... but it will get better and you'll be alright... we'll be alright..."
Kurda was never going to give up on Dean, not ever. He remembered when he got back from the Lake of Souls, the mess he'd been in, and the way Sam and Dean had never given up on him - they'd put him back together piece by piece and then filled in the cracks and now Kurda was going to do that for Dean or die trying.
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"No. I- I can't. I.. don't... know... how." At the near silent admission, the tears have seemed to stop, but he makes no move to dry his face with a hand or anything. I won't be alright. I'm staring down the business end of forever with out him. I can't bring him back - even if my soul was worth anything, he died old and naturally - and I can't even get to see him on the other side." And it's not like... he expects Kurda to stay with his ass all the time, or not and up dead somehow too. So... he's left with this.
This.
This is what he was afraid of most. Is his hell, far more effective than being peeled apart layer by layer.
Being alone.
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"There's nothing I can say to make this better for you," Kurda admitted, "There aren't any magic words to make it stop hurting, and I don't have a magic wand to bring him back... But I'm your friend and I'm here, I'm here for as long as you need me and whatever it is you need to do to get through this I'm going to help you. I'm no replacement for your brother, Dean, but you're not alone."
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"What I mean is... this is alone. You can't stay here forever. And I can't ask you to do that. So this is alone. and... there's only one thing I know how to do when alone." At that, his gaze moves from the floor to the dead host on the floor. Hunt. Kill. Make things suffer instead of him, and shift the pain. Run away from it all.
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Kurda wiped his eyes and finally let go of Dean. He took a deep, shuddering breath, banished the last of his sobs, then stood up.
"Now get up and stop acting like you're the only person who's ever lost someone close to them. You're going to get on the bike and we're going to get a pizza."
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"....If we're going to eat...." He starts hesitantly "...I'm going to need... food food." Besides, he really doesn't think he could stomach anything solid at the minute anyway.
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