SPN FIC - Where the Wild Things Aren't (Part 2 of 2)
The Muse and I spotted the setting for this little adventure some time ago. The OC followed pretty close behind, but none of us were quite sure what to do with 'em. But I think we've got a handle on it now: two exhausted brothers. A ramshackle house in the middle of nowhere. And a veil that's worn very thin in spots.
"Dean," Sam whispered. "Dean? What the hell, man."
CHARACTERS: Dean and Sam, OMC
GENRE: Gen
RATING: PG
SPOILERS: None (takes place in S7, prior to Death's Door)
LENGTH: 8000 words overall
Part 1 is here
(NB: If you read Part 1 the other day, go back and give it another look -- I've added more to it, so the story could be two lengthy parts, instead of 4 short ones.)
WHERE THE WILD THINGS AREN'T
By Carol Davis
"Curious?" Theodore asked.
"Outside," Dean said stubbornly, "is a bunch of trees. Dirt road that runs maybe a hundred yards in off County 56. Beat-up old Plymouth Sundance with one red door. Rest of it's painted with gray primer."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure I'm not gonna play this game."
"So you don't want to go out. You're not going to make use of the door."
"Nope."
"Sam?" Theodore said.
Sam was silent for a long while. At least, it seemed like a long while; Dean couldn't honestly say he'd been awake in this version of the house for five minutes or five hours. As Sam had pointed out, time had gone kind of weird.
Maybe it was all a dream.
"Who are you?" Sam asked Theodore. "What are you?"
"Someone who found his way here. By accident, I thought. Like you, I thought I'd found a place to sleep. To get in out of the rain."
"So you're human."
"Yes."
"What's outside that door?"
"Do what I did. Go. Look."
"Not doing it," Dean said. "Not gonna 'play our roles.' We did that once. Got us pretty much nowhere."
Theodore's expression shifted.
From somewhere outside - somewhere beyond the door - came the sound of laughter. No; giggling. Three or four different voices, all of them young, all of them happy. Having fun, it seemed like, as if what lay on the other side of that door was a playground, maybe one with swings and a slide and monkey bars. Sandbox. An ice cream wagon nearby.
Balloons.
Donuts.
"You got KIDS out there?" Dean roared, springing up from the floor, the movement causing Sam to tilt the other way to avoid toppling over. Dean headed for Theodore, but the little man disappeared before he could get there. "You son of a BITCH!" Dean all but screamed, pivoting off one boot, scanning the place for the little man even though he knew he wouldn't find him, that Theodore was enough of "not here" that he could still see and hear what was happening but couldn't serve as a target for Dean's sudden rage.
Sam was on his feet then, awkwardly, having to duck to avoid smacking his head on the too-low ceiling. "Dean," he said. "Dean, come on," though what he wanted Dean to do, or not do, wasn't clear. He still looked sad, damn him, when what he ought to look like was pissed off. Furious. Ready to FIX this situation.
Outside, that soft, musical laughter continued.
Maybe Sam would follow. Maybe he wouldn't. Dean let go of the question and strode across the little room to the door, grasped the slim metal lever that would undo the latch and flicked it up. Yanked the door toward him and sidestepped it, ready to confront whatever lay outside.
"Dean -" Sam said from behind him.
Later, he would swear he hadn't actually stepped over the threshold. That one moment he was standing inside the house and the next moment he wasn't, although he hadn't actually moved. That what divided inside from outside was nothing more than… nothing. A layer of cells. Some skin of reality. A portal, like the ones in science fiction movies.
"Gate" wasn't right.
"Gate" implied something physical, and this just… wasn't.
There were no children outside. Not nearby, at least. What lay outside - on the other side of the veil - was sunlight. An enormous, open field of grass and wildflowers. Off in the distance, a cluster of trees. A roll of low hills. A stream, good-sized, from the sound of it - though by rights the sound of rushing water shouldn't carry this far.
Nothing that looked like any of this lay outside, or anywhere near, the house he and Sam had taken refuge in.
"What the HELL," he complained.
"I don't think so," Sam said from behind him.
"Then what do you want to call it? What is all this?"
He half-turned. Glared at Sam, mostly for the sake of glaring at something. "I don't know," Sam said. "Could be Heaven, although I don't remember any lore about people just walking into Heaven. Or out of it."
"What, then?"
"It's like an antihistamine commercial."
Sure. Bright sunlight. Wildflowers. Seeing the world frigging Claratin clear.
Unsurprisingly, the little house was no longer behind them, but Dean had seen enough episodes of Star Trek to know the portal (the veil, the skin, whatever the hell you wanted to call it) was there somewhere. "I heard kids," he told Sam. "Whole bunch of 'em. Do me a favor and tell me you heard 'em too."
"I did."
"You humoring me?"
"No," Sam said.
"There's kids here somewhere. I'm gonna stick with that assumption."
Sam cranked his head back a bit, watching something cross the sky: a flock of small, colorful birds, headed for the trees on the horizon. He was in full Pondering Sammy mode as he studied the landscape around them, nodding at something now and then. "Squirrels," he said finally. "Birds. And there's a rabbit over that way, poking around in the grass."
There were a few clouds in the sky, all of them of the decorative variety, the type a child would draw with crayons.
"Kid heaven?" Dean proposed.
He didn't much like the idea. Didn't like the idea of dead kids to begin with.
Maybe it was a better assumption, now that the house had vanished, that Sam would follow him if he headed off toward the horizon, to see if some body of water did lie over there, if it was bubbling its way along, sparkling in the sunlight. Little fish swimming around in it, of a size fun to watch as you lay on your belly, fingers trailing in the water.
Maybe there were tadpoles.
"It goes by different names," Theodore's voice said, and he was suddenly there again, hands in his pockets, the bright sunlight turning his wispy hair to silver. "The ones who go back add to what they saw. Create grand adventures that supposedly took place here. None of it's true. Or maybe all of it's true. I suppose it depends on your point of view. What you consider 'real' to be."
"The ones who go back?" Sam echoed. "What… ones?"
"The children."
The little man was close enough to punch. Would have been, at least, if he'd been taller. As it was, connecting a fist with any part of him would have been an awkward maneuver. Really, the worst Dean could do to him was swing out a leg and trip him. "You lure kids here?" Dean growled. "Where are they?"
"There's no 'luring' going on, Dean. I told you: you find this place when you need it."
Sam shook his head. "You said the gate could draw you -"
"It can draw adults. When they're needed."
"Stop it," Dean barked. "Just STOP -"
"Neverland," Theodore said.
"What?"
"J. M. Barrie called it Neverland. L. Frank Baum called it Oz. Lewis Carroll, Wonderland. Years later. When they assumed what they'd seen was a dream, or a child's fantasy. They wrote stories about it. There are a lot of stories. Surely you know some of them."
"Wait," Sam said. "You're saying… Neverland is real?"
"You're standing in it."
"Oz? The Munchkins? Glinda the Good Witch of the North?"
"Baum took some dramatic license."
"My God," Sam said. "That's - that's just - wait a minute. Come on. The Mad Hatter? The Queen of Hearts?"
Theodore shrugged. "Slightly exaggerated."
"Then what isn't exaggerated?"
The little man turned away. Stood admiring what lay around him, his smile now deep and content, as if he were taking pride in something he'd spent a long time building. Basking in the fact that it had all turned out well, as if were a massive garden he'd planted, and all his crops were flourishing.
"You still don't quite buy it, do you?" he asked Dean after a minute. "You went a good part of your life refusing the possibility of angels. Of Heaven. And even after it's all been laid out in front of you, you still want to deny it. You'll accept the reality of Hell, of a place of torment and pain - but you refute the existence of the other side of that coin. Though really - it's a coin with many sides. It's not just an either/or."
"Are there kids here, or not?" Dean demanded.
"Of course."
"Where?"
"You'll rescue them, is that it? Haul them back? There's no need. Most of them go back on their own. Unharmed. With memories of grand and glorious things. Dreams of emerald cities and pirate ships."
"Flying," Sam said.
"That too."
"You said… 'most of them' go back?"
"Not all. Some stay."
"And what happens -"
"Pictures on milk cartons. On websites. They're assumed kidnapped. Dead. That part of it is unfortunate. It's a flawed system, in some respects. In others - it couldn't be more perfect. They walk through the veil, and they choose to stay. In the land where dreams are born. They choose. And they're safe here. Because of the guardians."
Dean only half-heard most of that.
Something still had hold of the back of his neck, talons digging deep into his flesh. His head roared with pain. When Theodore reached out to touch him, he jerked away from the little man's hand, unwilling to accept what looked like kindness - at least, what was intended to look like kindness.
He and Sam had had a quickly-gulped-down diner dinner yesterday - whenever yesterday was - and he was both starving and not at all hungry. Thirsty, but not. Exhausted, but not.
"You weren't here long enough to give it a name, were you?" Theodore asked.
"What?"
That was Sam. Sam, so enormous now. Not a little boy any more.
"There are gates," Theodore said. "I don't know how many. We're not told how many, or where they are. Each one has a guardian. Someone who stands sentry, keeping the bad things out. You could do that - both of you. Together, if you like. You'll have a place of your own, shaped exactly as you like it. An in-between, as the house is for me. If you're bored with it, you can change it with little more than a thought. Once in a while, a child will come through. Some ask questions. Some don't. It'll be up to you to answer."
They were following him - Sam and Theodore, dogging Dean's heels as he walked across the meadow, aiming for the cluster of trees at the horizon. For the sound of water and laughter.
Toward a place he began to believe he had seen before.
When he reached the crest of the first of those low hills, he could see the stream rolling along down below. Glittering in the sunlight, just as he'd imagined it.
Or had seen it.
"Do you remember?" Theodore asked him.
"No," he said firmly. "That's - it's a bunch of crap. You're messing with my head. Or this is a dream."
"Neither."
"It's CRAP."
Sam came closer. Stood in Dean's peripheral vision, frowning. Wearing that Pondering Sammy look. "Is he right?" he asked after a minute. "Were you here? Did you come here, as a little kid? When? I don't - you never said -"
"Because it's a bunch of horseshit, Sam."
"You asked a question," Theodore said.
Whether this was all fake, or not; whether it was some holodeck thing, or a dream, or some Trickster's construct, it was still solid enough to run in. Dean left his brother and the little man behind and ran full tilt, legs and arms pumping until they ached, head roaring, tears streaming down his cheeks. How long he ran, he had no idea, because it was true: time had no meaning whatsoever here. A second, a day, a year - they were all the same thing, and he knew without asking that Theodore had been here for more time than either of them could count. That Theodore's clothes made him look as if he'd walked out of the Alps sometime in the nineteenth century because that was probably where, and when, he'd crossed the veil. The little man had likely been here for more than a century - but it probably seemed like no more than a week.
Dean ran out of strength, finally, near the crest of yet another hill.
He let his legs fold up underneath him and sat cross-legged in the grass, face buried in his hands, sobbing. The tears ran down his wrists, underneath the cuffs of his sleeves. His nose ran dribbles of snot onto his palms.
"You can do your job," Theodore said. "The one you've always wanted to do. You can take care of the children."
Nothing changed.
Theodore was there, then he wasn't.
But Sam was.
After a while, Sam sat down beside him and rested a hand on Dean's shoulder. Said nothing at all, simply sat there and held on. Dean looked over at him once, as he wiped his streaming nose on the back of his hand. The tears had dried up somewhat, but something had a grip on the core of him, held it tight and constricted, as if his guts were bound up in an Ace bandage.
Finally, Sam asked softly, "When?"
Dean shook his head.
Sam let him sit there, let him hold onto his silence. They sat there long enough that if this had been a real place, the light would have changed as the sun began its customary slide toward the horizon. But nothing changed, except that somewhere off in the distance, the sound of laughter shifted, turned into singing.
"Maine," Dean said.
"What?"
"Someplace in Maine. There was this big field with a stone wall around it. Fieldstone. You know?"
Sam nodded. Didn't say anything.
"You were a baby. I don't know what was going on. I don't know why we stopped. But there was this field, and the sun was out. I saw this tree. Didn't look that far away - I guess I was bored. Tired of listening to you cry, or something. Maybe just bored. I don't know where Dad was. Couldn't have been far, I guess, not when you were still a baby. He didn't leave then, like he did later. So I started walking. Figured I'd walk to the tree and see if there was anything over there worth looking at, then I'd walk back. But when I got there, I could see this little stream, with fish in it. Minnows, I guess. Something. I played in the water for a while. Found a shiny rock that looked like gold. Seemed like I was there forever. And there was… somebody."
Sam's lips formed the word Who?
"I don't know. A woman, I think."
"And you asked her a question."
Theodore. Back again. Dean frowned at that, thinking Son of a bitch pops in and out more than friggin' Jeannie the Genie.
"Yeah," Dean muttered. "So what?"
Sam's fingers curled around Dean's shoulder. Dug in a little bit. "What did you ask her?"
Dean shook his head.
"Dean? What did you ask?"
Sunlight. A woman in an old-fashioned dress. Little fish swimming in glistening cool water. Birds singing in the trees. The grass so very, very green, and soft. No babies crying. No smelly motel room.
No Dad looking so very, very sad.
"Is my mom here?" Dean whispered. "I asked her, 'Is my mom here?'"
And the answer was "No."
Time was, Sam - all fat little arms and legs, hard solid head he would fling around like a volleyball - would lean into him. Would rest that hard little head against Dean's arm, or side, or chest and would expect to be held. Would use Dean as a prop, or a pillow, would drool and babble and singsong; would climb Dean like an obstacle, small fingers digging in, finding purchase in Dean's hair or shirt. He was warm then, unreasonably warm, like something that had been lying out in the sun a long time. Warm, and soft, except for that rock-hard head.
He would cry, back then, in great whooping shrieks. Would shit and piss and drool.
He's all POOPY, Dad. He's all nasty POOPY!
So were you. It'll stop. He'll… it'll stop.
Dad never quite looked like he believed it would stop.
"There are no Leviathan here," Theodore said. "No demons. No witches. None of the things you hunt. This is a safe place. A charmed place. It remains that way because of the guardians - those who protect the ones who choose to stay. You can do that, Dean - you and Sam. You can remove yourselves from the trenches, and do the job you've always felt was most important. You can protect the children."
The children…
Is my mom here?
No, Dean. There are no grownups here.
He could see only a slice of Sam's expression, because Sam was so close. Sam didn't turn his head; he sat with his arm slung around Dean, letting Dean use him as a prop. He felt warm, even here in the sunlight - felt unreasonably warm, and solid.
That head, Dean thought. Jesus Christ, that giant stone of a head.
"I left," Dean said. "Wasn't anything here I wanted. I left."
"Most of them do," Theodore replied. "They lose interest in what they find, and they go back. What's back there outweighs what's in here. Or what's not in here."
Is my mom here?
"You could experiment, I suppose," Theodore said. "I've never felt inclined to try it, but it's entirely up to you. Most of the rules don't apply here. Of course, things are a lot more flexible for the children, but I suppose it's worth a try. You might well be able to fly here. Get a good running start and see what happens." There was a gleam in his eye then, as if he'd given the matter a good deal of thought during the time he'd been here, even if he hadn't worked his way up to putting his theory to the test. "It could be that anything's possible here. Anything at all."
When neither of the Winchesters answered him, he went on. "You didn't simply blunder your way here, you know. The gate sought you out. Made it possible for you to come through. If anyone else had walked into that house - nothing would have happened. Other than bits of the roof falling in on them, I suppose."
"So it's a choice," Dean said.
"Absolutely."
"We get to say yes. Or no. Or… go screw yourself."
"Entirely up to you. I will say - it takes someone who's particularly motivated to do this job. Someone whose heart is entirely devoted to it. Not someone who's simply gotten fed up with what's going on out there." Theodore tipped his head toward something that wasn't there. At least, wasn't visible.
Dean gave him a long look. "But there's shit out there trying to get through."
"Now and then."
"Wanting to get in here and mess things up."
"As is always the case."
"Has it happened?" Sam asked. "Has anything - anyone - gotten through, who wasn't supposed to be here?"
"Not so far."
"Flying monkeys," Dean challenged.
Theodore grinned at that. "Artistic license. Mr. Baum had a flair for that. As did the creative team at MGM."
"How do you know all that? If you've been in here?"
"The job has… perks."
"It come with a dental plan?"
Theodore huffed out a small, amused breath, then went back to admiring his surroundings, though there was a slight, melancholy edge to his expression. "There are children living on garbage heaps," he said after a moment. "Children who live in terror of being beaten. Of being shot as they walk down the street. Children who are beaten and shot, every day. There are billions of children, Dean. There's a terrible need for this place."
"But you're not gonna manipulate me into making a decision."
"You were already aware of what the world is like. Somewhat more aware than most people, I believe."
Neverland.
Oz.
Through the rabbit hole.
Narnia.
You could maybe friggin' FLY here.
"There's monsters out there," Dean said. "They have their way, there won't be any kids left. They'll all be gone. All of it'll be gone. Can't give up on that. Can't just let it happen. I never could. We never could."
"Point taken," Theodore replied.
When Dean looked at his brother, Sam said quietly, "It's up to you, man. I'll follow your lead."
When had that ever been true?
And yet… when had it ever not been true?
"Is it us?" Dean asked the ground in front of his feet. "Is it us, or nothing? We do it, or nobody does it?"
"No," Theodore said.
"They'll be safe, either way."
"They always have been. We'll find someone else. There are billions of children - but there are also billions of adults who would protect them. They're not all up to the job. Really, very few of them are. But we'll find one, if we need to."
"Good," Dean said. He had to disengage himself from Sam in order to stumble to his feet; once he was up, he scrubbed again at his face. Worked his shoulders until the tension in them had eased a little bit. He looked down at Sam, searching for some clue to what Sam was thinking, but found nothing. No clue to what Sam might have wanted for himself. "We've already got a job," Dean told Theodore. "And there's not a billion of us out there who can do it."
"Fair enough," Theodore replied.
And the world spun away.
~~~~~~~~~~
"Dean? Dean. Are you -"
"Yeah. Sam. I'm awake."
The place didn't smell like donuts - not any more. Pretty much, it smelled of dead leaves and dry rot. Stagnant water. That sweet tang that said something had crawled into the walls, or that half-there ceiling, and had died, no more than a couple of days ago.
The crumpled Coleman bag beneath him was a better bed than bare floor, but not by much.
When he cracked an eye and looked, Sam was peering at him from close by. Lying on his side on his own sleeping bag. Frowning.
"Did you sleep?" Dean asked him.
"I - I don't know. I guess. Dean - what happened last night?"
"All of it," Dean said, knowing Sam would never let it go at that, that Sam would more than likely keep asking questions all day long. That he'd pick away at the situation the way he used to worry the holes in the knees of his jeans until the holes became palm-sized, until the lower legs of his pants all but fell off.
So, what else is new?
With luck, he wouldn't ask any questions for which the answer was "No."
"We oughta call Bobby," Dean said. "Check in. See what's going on in the rest of the world. You with me?"
Sam unfolded himself and stood up carefully. Wary of that low ceiling. Wary, too, maybe, of things he wasn't able to see. Of things that could change radically in a heartbeat. Of stepping across a threshold into some other place. His expression didn't change much as they gathered up their belongings and carried them out to the car, paused long enough to use the great outdoors as a bathroom, then spread out the map on the hood of the car and considered their next move.
Overhead, the sky was thick and gray and threatened rain.
"You came back," Sam said finally. "You turned your back on a place that was all rainbows and puppies. Where you never would have grown up."
"Yeah, Sam. I came back."
"But -"
"Captain Hook," Dean said. "'Off with his head!" Friggin' flying monkeys, dude. Come on."
"But the kid always won in those stories. Always."
Dean looked off down the road, past the beat-up car, at a hundred yards of dirt track leading back to County 56.
When he turned back to Sam he was smiling. There wasn't much juice behind it, but there'd been a day, he remembered, when Sam hadn't needed a whole lot of convincing.
"The kid could win this one," he told his brother. "You never know."
* * * * *
"Dean," Sam whispered. "Dean? What the hell, man."
CHARACTERS: Dean and Sam, OMC
GENRE: Gen
RATING: PG
SPOILERS: None (takes place in S7, prior to Death's Door)
LENGTH: 8000 words overall
Part 1 is here
(NB: If you read Part 1 the other day, go back and give it another look -- I've added more to it, so the story could be two lengthy parts, instead of 4 short ones.)
WHERE THE WILD THINGS AREN'T
By Carol Davis
"Curious?" Theodore asked.
"Outside," Dean said stubbornly, "is a bunch of trees. Dirt road that runs maybe a hundred yards in off County 56. Beat-up old Plymouth Sundance with one red door. Rest of it's painted with gray primer."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure I'm not gonna play this game."
"So you don't want to go out. You're not going to make use of the door."
"Nope."
"Sam?" Theodore said.
Sam was silent for a long while. At least, it seemed like a long while; Dean couldn't honestly say he'd been awake in this version of the house for five minutes or five hours. As Sam had pointed out, time had gone kind of weird.
Maybe it was all a dream.
"Who are you?" Sam asked Theodore. "What are you?"
"Someone who found his way here. By accident, I thought. Like you, I thought I'd found a place to sleep. To get in out of the rain."
"So you're human."
"Yes."
"What's outside that door?"
"Do what I did. Go. Look."
"Not doing it," Dean said. "Not gonna 'play our roles.' We did that once. Got us pretty much nowhere."
Theodore's expression shifted.
From somewhere outside - somewhere beyond the door - came the sound of laughter. No; giggling. Three or four different voices, all of them young, all of them happy. Having fun, it seemed like, as if what lay on the other side of that door was a playground, maybe one with swings and a slide and monkey bars. Sandbox. An ice cream wagon nearby.
Balloons.
Donuts.
"You got KIDS out there?" Dean roared, springing up from the floor, the movement causing Sam to tilt the other way to avoid toppling over. Dean headed for Theodore, but the little man disappeared before he could get there. "You son of a BITCH!" Dean all but screamed, pivoting off one boot, scanning the place for the little man even though he knew he wouldn't find him, that Theodore was enough of "not here" that he could still see and hear what was happening but couldn't serve as a target for Dean's sudden rage.
Sam was on his feet then, awkwardly, having to duck to avoid smacking his head on the too-low ceiling. "Dean," he said. "Dean, come on," though what he wanted Dean to do, or not do, wasn't clear. He still looked sad, damn him, when what he ought to look like was pissed off. Furious. Ready to FIX this situation.
Outside, that soft, musical laughter continued.
Maybe Sam would follow. Maybe he wouldn't. Dean let go of the question and strode across the little room to the door, grasped the slim metal lever that would undo the latch and flicked it up. Yanked the door toward him and sidestepped it, ready to confront whatever lay outside.
"Dean -" Sam said from behind him.
Later, he would swear he hadn't actually stepped over the threshold. That one moment he was standing inside the house and the next moment he wasn't, although he hadn't actually moved. That what divided inside from outside was nothing more than… nothing. A layer of cells. Some skin of reality. A portal, like the ones in science fiction movies.
"Gate" wasn't right.
"Gate" implied something physical, and this just… wasn't.
There were no children outside. Not nearby, at least. What lay outside - on the other side of the veil - was sunlight. An enormous, open field of grass and wildflowers. Off in the distance, a cluster of trees. A roll of low hills. A stream, good-sized, from the sound of it - though by rights the sound of rushing water shouldn't carry this far.
Nothing that looked like any of this lay outside, or anywhere near, the house he and Sam had taken refuge in.
"What the HELL," he complained.
"I don't think so," Sam said from behind him.
"Then what do you want to call it? What is all this?"
He half-turned. Glared at Sam, mostly for the sake of glaring at something. "I don't know," Sam said. "Could be Heaven, although I don't remember any lore about people just walking into Heaven. Or out of it."
"What, then?"
"It's like an antihistamine commercial."
Sure. Bright sunlight. Wildflowers. Seeing the world frigging Claratin clear.
Unsurprisingly, the little house was no longer behind them, but Dean had seen enough episodes of Star Trek to know the portal (the veil, the skin, whatever the hell you wanted to call it) was there somewhere. "I heard kids," he told Sam. "Whole bunch of 'em. Do me a favor and tell me you heard 'em too."
"I did."
"You humoring me?"
"No," Sam said.
"There's kids here somewhere. I'm gonna stick with that assumption."
Sam cranked his head back a bit, watching something cross the sky: a flock of small, colorful birds, headed for the trees on the horizon. He was in full Pondering Sammy mode as he studied the landscape around them, nodding at something now and then. "Squirrels," he said finally. "Birds. And there's a rabbit over that way, poking around in the grass."
There were a few clouds in the sky, all of them of the decorative variety, the type a child would draw with crayons.
"Kid heaven?" Dean proposed.
He didn't much like the idea. Didn't like the idea of dead kids to begin with.
Maybe it was a better assumption, now that the house had vanished, that Sam would follow him if he headed off toward the horizon, to see if some body of water did lie over there, if it was bubbling its way along, sparkling in the sunlight. Little fish swimming around in it, of a size fun to watch as you lay on your belly, fingers trailing in the water.
Maybe there were tadpoles.
"It goes by different names," Theodore's voice said, and he was suddenly there again, hands in his pockets, the bright sunlight turning his wispy hair to silver. "The ones who go back add to what they saw. Create grand adventures that supposedly took place here. None of it's true. Or maybe all of it's true. I suppose it depends on your point of view. What you consider 'real' to be."
"The ones who go back?" Sam echoed. "What… ones?"
"The children."
The little man was close enough to punch. Would have been, at least, if he'd been taller. As it was, connecting a fist with any part of him would have been an awkward maneuver. Really, the worst Dean could do to him was swing out a leg and trip him. "You lure kids here?" Dean growled. "Where are they?"
"There's no 'luring' going on, Dean. I told you: you find this place when you need it."
Sam shook his head. "You said the gate could draw you -"
"It can draw adults. When they're needed."
"Stop it," Dean barked. "Just STOP -"
"Neverland," Theodore said.
"What?"
"J. M. Barrie called it Neverland. L. Frank Baum called it Oz. Lewis Carroll, Wonderland. Years later. When they assumed what they'd seen was a dream, or a child's fantasy. They wrote stories about it. There are a lot of stories. Surely you know some of them."
"Wait," Sam said. "You're saying… Neverland is real?"
"You're standing in it."
"Oz? The Munchkins? Glinda the Good Witch of the North?"
"Baum took some dramatic license."
"My God," Sam said. "That's - that's just - wait a minute. Come on. The Mad Hatter? The Queen of Hearts?"
Theodore shrugged. "Slightly exaggerated."
"Then what isn't exaggerated?"
The little man turned away. Stood admiring what lay around him, his smile now deep and content, as if he were taking pride in something he'd spent a long time building. Basking in the fact that it had all turned out well, as if were a massive garden he'd planted, and all his crops were flourishing.
"You still don't quite buy it, do you?" he asked Dean after a minute. "You went a good part of your life refusing the possibility of angels. Of Heaven. And even after it's all been laid out in front of you, you still want to deny it. You'll accept the reality of Hell, of a place of torment and pain - but you refute the existence of the other side of that coin. Though really - it's a coin with many sides. It's not just an either/or."
"Are there kids here, or not?" Dean demanded.
"Of course."
"Where?"
"You'll rescue them, is that it? Haul them back? There's no need. Most of them go back on their own. Unharmed. With memories of grand and glorious things. Dreams of emerald cities and pirate ships."
"Flying," Sam said.
"That too."
"You said… 'most of them' go back?"
"Not all. Some stay."
"And what happens -"
"Pictures on milk cartons. On websites. They're assumed kidnapped. Dead. That part of it is unfortunate. It's a flawed system, in some respects. In others - it couldn't be more perfect. They walk through the veil, and they choose to stay. In the land where dreams are born. They choose. And they're safe here. Because of the guardians."
Dean only half-heard most of that.
Something still had hold of the back of his neck, talons digging deep into his flesh. His head roared with pain. When Theodore reached out to touch him, he jerked away from the little man's hand, unwilling to accept what looked like kindness - at least, what was intended to look like kindness.
He and Sam had had a quickly-gulped-down diner dinner yesterday - whenever yesterday was - and he was both starving and not at all hungry. Thirsty, but not. Exhausted, but not.
"You weren't here long enough to give it a name, were you?" Theodore asked.
"What?"
That was Sam. Sam, so enormous now. Not a little boy any more.
"There are gates," Theodore said. "I don't know how many. We're not told how many, or where they are. Each one has a guardian. Someone who stands sentry, keeping the bad things out. You could do that - both of you. Together, if you like. You'll have a place of your own, shaped exactly as you like it. An in-between, as the house is for me. If you're bored with it, you can change it with little more than a thought. Once in a while, a child will come through. Some ask questions. Some don't. It'll be up to you to answer."
They were following him - Sam and Theodore, dogging Dean's heels as he walked across the meadow, aiming for the cluster of trees at the horizon. For the sound of water and laughter.
Toward a place he began to believe he had seen before.
When he reached the crest of the first of those low hills, he could see the stream rolling along down below. Glittering in the sunlight, just as he'd imagined it.
Or had seen it.
"Do you remember?" Theodore asked him.
"No," he said firmly. "That's - it's a bunch of crap. You're messing with my head. Or this is a dream."
"Neither."
"It's CRAP."
Sam came closer. Stood in Dean's peripheral vision, frowning. Wearing that Pondering Sammy look. "Is he right?" he asked after a minute. "Were you here? Did you come here, as a little kid? When? I don't - you never said -"
"Because it's a bunch of horseshit, Sam."
"You asked a question," Theodore said.
Whether this was all fake, or not; whether it was some holodeck thing, or a dream, or some Trickster's construct, it was still solid enough to run in. Dean left his brother and the little man behind and ran full tilt, legs and arms pumping until they ached, head roaring, tears streaming down his cheeks. How long he ran, he had no idea, because it was true: time had no meaning whatsoever here. A second, a day, a year - they were all the same thing, and he knew without asking that Theodore had been here for more time than either of them could count. That Theodore's clothes made him look as if he'd walked out of the Alps sometime in the nineteenth century because that was probably where, and when, he'd crossed the veil. The little man had likely been here for more than a century - but it probably seemed like no more than a week.
Dean ran out of strength, finally, near the crest of yet another hill.
He let his legs fold up underneath him and sat cross-legged in the grass, face buried in his hands, sobbing. The tears ran down his wrists, underneath the cuffs of his sleeves. His nose ran dribbles of snot onto his palms.
"You can do your job," Theodore said. "The one you've always wanted to do. You can take care of the children."
Nothing changed.
Theodore was there, then he wasn't.
But Sam was.
After a while, Sam sat down beside him and rested a hand on Dean's shoulder. Said nothing at all, simply sat there and held on. Dean looked over at him once, as he wiped his streaming nose on the back of his hand. The tears had dried up somewhat, but something had a grip on the core of him, held it tight and constricted, as if his guts were bound up in an Ace bandage.
Finally, Sam asked softly, "When?"
Dean shook his head.
Sam let him sit there, let him hold onto his silence. They sat there long enough that if this had been a real place, the light would have changed as the sun began its customary slide toward the horizon. But nothing changed, except that somewhere off in the distance, the sound of laughter shifted, turned into singing.
"Maine," Dean said.
"What?"
"Someplace in Maine. There was this big field with a stone wall around it. Fieldstone. You know?"
Sam nodded. Didn't say anything.
"You were a baby. I don't know what was going on. I don't know why we stopped. But there was this field, and the sun was out. I saw this tree. Didn't look that far away - I guess I was bored. Tired of listening to you cry, or something. Maybe just bored. I don't know where Dad was. Couldn't have been far, I guess, not when you were still a baby. He didn't leave then, like he did later. So I started walking. Figured I'd walk to the tree and see if there was anything over there worth looking at, then I'd walk back. But when I got there, I could see this little stream, with fish in it. Minnows, I guess. Something. I played in the water for a while. Found a shiny rock that looked like gold. Seemed like I was there forever. And there was… somebody."
Sam's lips formed the word Who?
"I don't know. A woman, I think."
"And you asked her a question."
Theodore. Back again. Dean frowned at that, thinking Son of a bitch pops in and out more than friggin' Jeannie the Genie.
"Yeah," Dean muttered. "So what?"
Sam's fingers curled around Dean's shoulder. Dug in a little bit. "What did you ask her?"
Dean shook his head.
"Dean? What did you ask?"
Sunlight. A woman in an old-fashioned dress. Little fish swimming in glistening cool water. Birds singing in the trees. The grass so very, very green, and soft. No babies crying. No smelly motel room.
No Dad looking so very, very sad.
"Is my mom here?" Dean whispered. "I asked her, 'Is my mom here?'"
And the answer was "No."
Time was, Sam - all fat little arms and legs, hard solid head he would fling around like a volleyball - would lean into him. Would rest that hard little head against Dean's arm, or side, or chest and would expect to be held. Would use Dean as a prop, or a pillow, would drool and babble and singsong; would climb Dean like an obstacle, small fingers digging in, finding purchase in Dean's hair or shirt. He was warm then, unreasonably warm, like something that had been lying out in the sun a long time. Warm, and soft, except for that rock-hard head.
He would cry, back then, in great whooping shrieks. Would shit and piss and drool.
He's all POOPY, Dad. He's all nasty POOPY!
So were you. It'll stop. He'll… it'll stop.
Dad never quite looked like he believed it would stop.
"There are no Leviathan here," Theodore said. "No demons. No witches. None of the things you hunt. This is a safe place. A charmed place. It remains that way because of the guardians - those who protect the ones who choose to stay. You can do that, Dean - you and Sam. You can remove yourselves from the trenches, and do the job you've always felt was most important. You can protect the children."
The children…
Is my mom here?
No, Dean. There are no grownups here.
He could see only a slice of Sam's expression, because Sam was so close. Sam didn't turn his head; he sat with his arm slung around Dean, letting Dean use him as a prop. He felt warm, even here in the sunlight - felt unreasonably warm, and solid.
That head, Dean thought. Jesus Christ, that giant stone of a head.
"I left," Dean said. "Wasn't anything here I wanted. I left."
"Most of them do," Theodore replied. "They lose interest in what they find, and they go back. What's back there outweighs what's in here. Or what's not in here."
Is my mom here?
"You could experiment, I suppose," Theodore said. "I've never felt inclined to try it, but it's entirely up to you. Most of the rules don't apply here. Of course, things are a lot more flexible for the children, but I suppose it's worth a try. You might well be able to fly here. Get a good running start and see what happens." There was a gleam in his eye then, as if he'd given the matter a good deal of thought during the time he'd been here, even if he hadn't worked his way up to putting his theory to the test. "It could be that anything's possible here. Anything at all."
When neither of the Winchesters answered him, he went on. "You didn't simply blunder your way here, you know. The gate sought you out. Made it possible for you to come through. If anyone else had walked into that house - nothing would have happened. Other than bits of the roof falling in on them, I suppose."
"So it's a choice," Dean said.
"Absolutely."
"We get to say yes. Or no. Or… go screw yourself."
"Entirely up to you. I will say - it takes someone who's particularly motivated to do this job. Someone whose heart is entirely devoted to it. Not someone who's simply gotten fed up with what's going on out there." Theodore tipped his head toward something that wasn't there. At least, wasn't visible.
Dean gave him a long look. "But there's shit out there trying to get through."
"Now and then."
"Wanting to get in here and mess things up."
"As is always the case."
"Has it happened?" Sam asked. "Has anything - anyone - gotten through, who wasn't supposed to be here?"
"Not so far."
"Flying monkeys," Dean challenged.
Theodore grinned at that. "Artistic license. Mr. Baum had a flair for that. As did the creative team at MGM."
"How do you know all that? If you've been in here?"
"The job has… perks."
"It come with a dental plan?"
Theodore huffed out a small, amused breath, then went back to admiring his surroundings, though there was a slight, melancholy edge to his expression. "There are children living on garbage heaps," he said after a moment. "Children who live in terror of being beaten. Of being shot as they walk down the street. Children who are beaten and shot, every day. There are billions of children, Dean. There's a terrible need for this place."
"But you're not gonna manipulate me into making a decision."
"You were already aware of what the world is like. Somewhat more aware than most people, I believe."
Neverland.
Oz.
Through the rabbit hole.
Narnia.
You could maybe friggin' FLY here.
"There's monsters out there," Dean said. "They have their way, there won't be any kids left. They'll all be gone. All of it'll be gone. Can't give up on that. Can't just let it happen. I never could. We never could."
"Point taken," Theodore replied.
When Dean looked at his brother, Sam said quietly, "It's up to you, man. I'll follow your lead."
When had that ever been true?
And yet… when had it ever not been true?
"Is it us?" Dean asked the ground in front of his feet. "Is it us, or nothing? We do it, or nobody does it?"
"No," Theodore said.
"They'll be safe, either way."
"They always have been. We'll find someone else. There are billions of children - but there are also billions of adults who would protect them. They're not all up to the job. Really, very few of them are. But we'll find one, if we need to."
"Good," Dean said. He had to disengage himself from Sam in order to stumble to his feet; once he was up, he scrubbed again at his face. Worked his shoulders until the tension in them had eased a little bit. He looked down at Sam, searching for some clue to what Sam was thinking, but found nothing. No clue to what Sam might have wanted for himself. "We've already got a job," Dean told Theodore. "And there's not a billion of us out there who can do it."
"Fair enough," Theodore replied.
And the world spun away.
~~~~~~~~~~
"Dean? Dean. Are you -"
"Yeah. Sam. I'm awake."
The place didn't smell like donuts - not any more. Pretty much, it smelled of dead leaves and dry rot. Stagnant water. That sweet tang that said something had crawled into the walls, or that half-there ceiling, and had died, no more than a couple of days ago.
The crumpled Coleman bag beneath him was a better bed than bare floor, but not by much.
When he cracked an eye and looked, Sam was peering at him from close by. Lying on his side on his own sleeping bag. Frowning.
"Did you sleep?" Dean asked him.
"I - I don't know. I guess. Dean - what happened last night?"
"All of it," Dean said, knowing Sam would never let it go at that, that Sam would more than likely keep asking questions all day long. That he'd pick away at the situation the way he used to worry the holes in the knees of his jeans until the holes became palm-sized, until the lower legs of his pants all but fell off.
So, what else is new?
With luck, he wouldn't ask any questions for which the answer was "No."
"We oughta call Bobby," Dean said. "Check in. See what's going on in the rest of the world. You with me?"
Sam unfolded himself and stood up carefully. Wary of that low ceiling. Wary, too, maybe, of things he wasn't able to see. Of things that could change radically in a heartbeat. Of stepping across a threshold into some other place. His expression didn't change much as they gathered up their belongings and carried them out to the car, paused long enough to use the great outdoors as a bathroom, then spread out the map on the hood of the car and considered their next move.
Overhead, the sky was thick and gray and threatened rain.
"You came back," Sam said finally. "You turned your back on a place that was all rainbows and puppies. Where you never would have grown up."
"Yeah, Sam. I came back."
"But -"
"Captain Hook," Dean said. "'Off with his head!" Friggin' flying monkeys, dude. Come on."
"But the kid always won in those stories. Always."
Dean looked off down the road, past the beat-up car, at a hundred yards of dirt track leading back to County 56.
When he turned back to Sam he was smiling. There wasn't much juice behind it, but there'd been a day, he remembered, when Sam hadn't needed a whole lot of convincing.
"The kid could win this one," he told his brother. "You never know."
* * * * *