Save Me Sioux Falls 2/4
Title: Save Me Sioux Falls 2/?
Author: darth_firefly
Rating: Hard R bordering on NC-17
Genre/pairing: Gen, mentions of Dean/Castiel
Characters: Dean, Sam, Castiel, Bobby
Word count: 8777
Summary: What started out as a comment prompt of: Dean suffers from amnesia and starts living a regular life. He'd get it too, if it weren't for those two crazy stalkers who keep trying to talk to him about demons and fighting ghosts. Sam and Cas keep trying to tell Dean the truth, but he won't believe them when they tell him he's Dean Winchester, because even the cops know that Dean Winchester died two years ago. --> Turned into something more than comment fic.
Spoilers: General spoilers up to Season 5, I suppose.
Warnings: I did not have a beta. I apologize for that. The person who was going to beta hasn't replied in a week and my muse was getting bitchy.
Part One
Dean did not stay the night in New Orleans. After dropping off his shipment, his cab had been hooked up to another trailer that needed to be in Memphis by noon the next day. Eager to close the gap between work and the Mayfleet farm, he'd scarfed down a quick lunch - and headed back north. He didn't want to run the risk of having another vision attack, or whatever it was far from home. Harry Mayfleet wasn't a good long distance driver and as for Shannon? Forget it - the furthest that woman went from the farm was St. Louis. If he had another attack and had to stop driving, he didn't want to think what would happen. Besides, Memphis was a hell of a lot closer than New Orleans to Lexington. As he headed into Mississippi, he thought back to the guy whose breakfast he'd bought.
It wasn't like he had a problem with doing it, not in the slightest. Shannon was fond of saying that there was enough misery in this world and whatever goodwill a person could put back into the human race was welcome. The guy had seemed surprised that he'd done such a thing - maybe he hadn't had enough kindness in his life, or something. Dean rubbed the back of his neck, frowning. There'd also been something in the look he gave him - as if Sam Wesson had known him. Sam Wesson... He frowned. A vague memory of a technical services man at some company came to him - he had also been named Sam Wesson. Perhaps they were one in the same - but as Dean didn't have any records of his past, other than the mismatched fingerprints from some felon who'd died in Colorado, it seemed unlikely. Wesson, while not a very common last name - Sam, on the other hand - seemed to be a somewhat popular first one. Odds were he met the Wesson fellow at the loading dock of that company or something of that nature.
Smith, as far as Dean knew, wasn't his real last name. He'd only chosen to make it his last name because it was common enough that no one would think it was obviously made up. He was fairly certain however that Dean was his first name. He was basing it on the rather upsetting memory of a man, whom he assumed was his father, yelling at him. Damn it, Dean, stop crying! You're eight years old! It's just a fucking scrape! Stop dragging your feet! He gritted his teeth at the memory, just as he had the first time he'd had it. First of all, if this man was his father, he couldn't believe that he'd used coarse language around an eight year old. Secondly, he could remember the wound - it'd not been just a scraped knee, but rather the whole right side of his right calf - he'd slid down a rocky hill and torn half the flesh on his leg off. Hell, that'd make almost anyone cry - especially an eight year old kid.
Maybe his father was just a mean asshole and he, Dean, had gotten his mother's personality instead of his father's. Something also told him that both his parents were dead - and that his mother had died when he was little. He had a feeling that his mom probably wouldn't have put up with anyone talking to her son in the manner his father had talked to him. He figured that if he could somehow remember his birthday - his driver's license stated it was January first, nineteen seventy-nine - then he might be able to find out who he was. After all, how many guys named Dean his age could there be? He'd searched around on the Internet for missing person reports and found nothing. If someone was looking for him, they weren't using mass-media sources.
In that tangent, however, he'd scanned countless fliers in truck stops, weigh stations and in almost every Wal-Mart he went into of missing children. He'd yet to match a face with a missing child, but for some reason, he wanted to find one of those missing kids almost more than anything. He wanted to help some missing child get back to their own home - because home is where they belonged. As the Mayfleets were the only home he knew, he figured that if he could help some missing child, he might be able to find his own way home. He chuckled somewhat amusedly as he pulled into a weigh station, thinking that perhaps Shannon should have given him a Saint Anthony medal instead of Saint Christopher - so that he, a lost person, could be found. With no parents to look for him - that only left friends and younger siblings... if he had any, that is.
“Afternoon.” The man in the small building said over the speaker. “Where you headed?”
“Memphis.” Dean replied. “How are you doing?”
“Not bad, not bad.” He said back to him. “What's in the tanker?”
“Molasses.” He steered the vehicle slowly onto the scale. “How's the weather look up north?”
“Rain, rain and more rain - the front goes from Jackson all the way to Springfield, Illinois.” He made a few adjustments on the computer in front of him. “Okay, you're good.”
“Thanks.” Dean said and slowly pulled away from the scales and back onto the interstate. For some reason, he half expected to see that black Impala show up in his side-view mirror. He wasn't sure what he'd do if it did. As he headed forward on his northward journey, something in his mind jolted into place - a big, black truck. He had a vision of sitting in another car and saw the massive vehicle charge right at him and sudden vanish as if it had been vaporized. It'd happened here, in Mississippi. He snorted at the sheer stupidity of the idea. Things just didn't vanish into thin air. It might just be the memory of some dream that he'd one had, but it seemed very real. He took a sip from the bottle of Coke in his console and tried to ignore it.
But it was like when he watched those cheesy horror movies on television on nights when he wasn't up for pool. He'd watch movies about vampires and think that staking them through the heart wasn't going to do anything more than piss them off - for some reason, he was convinced that you had to cut their heads off and then burn their body. Now why the hell he thought that, he had no idea. Then again, you cut any thing's head off, it was bound to kill them. Except werewolves. Werewolves you had to shoot or stab straight in the heart with silver. At least the horror films seemed to get that right. “What the hell am I thinking about this for?” He laughed at himself. “There's no such thing as vampires or werewolves.” A minute later, he shook his head. “And now I've started talking to myself, that can't be good.” He took another swig of soda and drove in silence for a while longer. Maybe he'd always talked to himself or was used to always having a companion in the car with him - so he'd had someone to talk to. “Maybe I should get a dog.” He shook his head. “Stop talking to yourself Dean, you're going to drive yourself crazier than you already are.”
Chuckling, he hit a few buttons on the radio and found a classic rock station that was blaring a song he recognized as one of Bon Jovi's newer tunes called 'We Weren't Born to Follow'. In lieu of talking to himself, which he was pretty sure wasn't good - he started to sing along with the music in his horrible off-key voice. “This road was paved by the hopeless and the hungry...”
“Bon Jovi?”
“Bon Jovi rocks - on occasion.”
**
Castiel had patiently removed all the guns, ammunition and knives from the panic room in Bobby Singer's basement. After cleaning out the direct weapons, he had removed the other implements, like rope, leather bands and chains. With the storage lockers now empty, the room that was meant to be a safe haven from which a hunter could wage war with practically anything that walked on or below the earth, it now actually looked a little forlorn. The even whump of the ceiling fan far above him was the only sound as he calmly changed the sheets on the bed. They hadn't been changed since Sam had been locked in here the night before he killed Lilith. The angel had very few qualms about locking Dean in here and somehow make his memory snap back into place. He wasn't quite ready to go find Gabriel and beg the archangel to cure Dean. It wasn't that he doubted his elder brother would do it - but the cost for that caliber of favor would undoubtedly be high. Castiel had a feeling it would be automatic two automatic 'yeses' from Sam and Dean to Lucifer and Michael. The thought of that alone made him try and put the idea out of his mind. It also made him wish they had a plan D.
Checking all the cabinets one last time, he went to the door, turned the lights out and headed back up the stairs. Bobby was almost exactly where he'd left him a few hours earlier, sitting behind his desk, pouring through a book - the only thing that had changed was the book he was reading and the very worried expression on the man's face. “It is ready.”
“This ain't going to work.” The hunter shook his head. “This spell on repressed memories.” He tossed down the pencil he was holding. “Not unless you can play Sherlock Holmes and Jim Bridger at the same time and find the damn rock or the exact spot where Dean fell. We need something from that precise area as a component.”
“Perhaps being among what should be familiar will be enough.” He walked towards the window and looked out at the salvage yard, the flood lights casting halos of light where the stood. He wasn't looking at them - he looked at the shadows between them, searching for any hidden danger. “As long as Sam can find where he now calls home.”
“The human mind is a complex thing, Cas.” Bobby said, wheeling himself away from his desk and into the kitchen to retrieve another bottle of beer.
“I am aware of that, Mr. Singer.” He slowly turned back towards him.
“You sure you don't have any way of curing him?”
“No.” He replied flatly and went to sit on the couch.
“And you're also certain that this isn't one of your family member's doing?”
“Positive. If Zachariah was behind this, Dean would have already said yes to Michael.”
“Damn it.” Bobby said under his breath as he came back into the room. “Just out of curiosity, the angels couldn't resurrect Adam Milligan to make him Lucifer's vessel, could they?”
“No. If the angels needed to resurrect Adam, it would be to make him Michael's vessel. While he is John Winchester's youngest son, his is Kate Milligan's oldest and only.”
“You have any idea how insane that sounds?”
The angel gave him an odd look, tilting his head to one side. “Do you have any idea how insane the Normandy Invasion sounded to me when I first heard it?”
The hunter raised his eyebrows. “Surely you knew that was going to work.”
“I did not. Contrary to what you may believe or think, I am not omnipotent. I never doubted that the Allied forces would win the Second World War, I just did not think it would happen as swiftly as it did.”
“You call a war that was seven years long swift?” Bobby was counting all of the war, just not America's involvement.
“Compared to the wars of Europe in the earlier part of the last millennium, yes.” He picked up one of the books that was lying on the coffee table in front of him and slowly started to leaf through it.
Bobby shook his head and wheeled himself back to his desk. “You have a point. Are there any other plans that mankind has carried out that sounded crazy the first time you heard them?”
Cas found the man's attempt at sarcasm strongly reminiscent of Dean. “I believed the American Colonies were foolhardy to challenge what at the time was the most powerful empire on earth for their Independence.”
“Cas - you have a lot of doubts for someone who is supposed to be divine.”
“Doubt in concerns of the ways of men is not forbidden. Heaven does not take sides in the wars of men. If we did, then the Crusades would not have failed.”
Bobby looked down into half-empty bottle. “If we're going to keep this conversation up, I'm going to need something a hell of a lot stronger than this.”
**
As Castiel did not require sleep, he spent the night sitting at the kitchen table, staring at the six filled shot glasses in front of him like they were nothing. That's because six shots weren't nearly enough to get him mildly drunk. He doubted the whole bottle of tequila would be enough to get him even halfway there. Not that he really wanted to be anyway... He took a deep breath and knocked back all six shots and added a seventh glass. Seven shots for the seven brothers and sisters that Uriel had killed in his quest to free Lucifer. Seven siblings who had died in vain. Looking back now, he can see that it made no sense. He and all angels of his rank were given the same instruction save the seals at any cost. It was nearly a year ago that he had rebelled against Heaven's will. A will that he now saw most certainly didn't benefit anyone but the angels - even if things went the wrong way - they would seek haven elsewhere. They would go to a place where vessels weren't needed and they could walk on the surface of some distant planet undisturbed, letting mankind burn in their absence.
Love mankind more than you love Me - the single instruction given to angels regarding humans from God. Or so he was told - he'd never met the man, he'd received the edict from Michael eons ago. You didn't argue with your superiors - least of all an archangel. So he obeyed - and then rebelled against his family for the sake of mankind. Isn't that just the sort of thing that testifies to loving humans?
He looked at the upside-down glasses, resisting the urge to shatter them. Maybe this was just another human emotion he was starting to feel and this one wasn't a pleasant one. He had at best, managed to get a decent grasp on one feeling - friendship and, until Dean's disappearance, had been getting a good sense of love that was more amorous and less camaraderie. This new feeling he could name and he hated it with a passion. He hated that he knew what it was and that he was feeling it.
Jealousy.
He had known Dean was alive, but not the circumstances. He did not like them and he was having trouble with waiting to change it. Perhaps when it was over he might find the way to express the thoughts in his head - the unrelenting feeling that made him want to scream. To know that someone other than him had been there - someone else had put the hunter back up on his feet. There was someone or more than one person who was helping him heal the wounds. If it was Sam, he knew he wouldn't be this way. Sam was his brother and, being a brother himself - knew better than to mess with the bonds of siblings. The one between the two Winchesters was, without a doubt, among the strongest he'd ever seen. He couldn't think of a pair of angels who were as close as Sam and Dean. Hell, if it was Sam who'd found Dean, Cas knew that he'd also have a part in it.
For now, all he could do was wait. Waiting was actually one of the things angels did very, very well. He could remember waiting for countless events in human history. Some he had looked forward to with all the expectation and hope that a child had for Christmas. He can remember waiting for the first Christmas, a memory now that had gone bittersweet. He closed his eyes, remembering that night. His whole garrison, led by Anna, had taken human vessels and had been in Bethlehem. He can remember coming back to Heaven with a sense of wonder that he'd never felt. If he, an Angel of the Lord had been nearly overcome, it was nothing short of miraculous that those shepherds he and a few other angels had visited were able to walk. It was a sense of change in mankind he would not feel again for nearly fifteen hundred years when Columbus sailed to the Americas and unknowingly set this whole plan now unfolding in human history into motion. Waiting was a natural part of being an angel - and also one of the hardest.
He looked back down at the shot glasses and carefully stacked them together and took them over to the sink, with the tiniest fraction of a stagger. After placing them down slowly, he turned the faucet on and when the water was hot, he started to clean them as well as the rest of the dishes stacked in the sink. It was one of the few tasks he could do for Bobby. It also helped pass the time.
**
Sam both lauded and lamented the lack of smoking in bars. It was rather pleasant not to reek of smoke for hours after being in said bar. Not to mention that even when it'd been bellow freezing Dean had insisted on driving with at least two of the windows down so the scent wouldn't become ingrained in the Impala's leather interior. The real problem was that now you found out just out how many other unpleasant smells that smoke had been covering up. Whereas once the places he and his brother had frequented had just reeked with a myriad of cigarettes and cigars and the occasional pipe, now there was the sickly sweet smell of cheap perfume, even cheaper cologne, beer and more often than not, body odor that was just short of nauseating. Perhaps to the normal person these scents would make one sick, but as he was familiar with the reek of blood, decay and burning flesh - he had a higher tolerance for bad smelling people. At least none of them smelled like sulfur or death - quite possibly the two worst scents in existence... and the last two you wanted to encounter in combination with each other.
For tonight, however, the worst smell Sam had to deal with was the man standing across from him - he reeked of some imitation aftershave. What made it more funny than sick was the fact that the man needed to shave - or make up his mind if he was going to have a goatee or a full face beard. Right now the guy looked like a Civil War movie reject - he looked a cross between Jeff Daniels in Gettysburg and Chuck Shurley. Doing his best not to laugh and ignore the absurdity of it, he turned his attention back to the pool game he was losing on purpose. He'd picked this bar in New Orleans purely for the classic metal rock covers by the band in the corner that, if they played any louder, they might be able to mask the stench of bad perfume with sound. Sam had a feeling that a little thing like amnesia wouldn't change his brother's taste in music. He didn't count the time that Zachariah had screwed with their heads in order to make them realize they were meant to be hunters and not nine-to-five workers.
Right now, however, he turned his full attention to the game as his opponent sank the eight ball in the corner pocket. This marked the third game he'd lost to the guy, the pot of five hundred dollars jammed underneath an upside-down pilsner glass. It was time to stop playing the bungling novice who'd just 'played a few games in college' and start playing the pool shark he was. He'd played his first game of pool at the age of five - and at the age of eleven, won fifty dollars in a game against a college student at some tavern in Idaho whose name he didn't remember. The only real problem was that all he had left in terms of cash was twenty dollars - that already belonged to the bar for the few beers he'd drunk.
“You up for another round?” The lean man folded his arms, grinning at him.
“Sure...” He leaned against the table, idly staring at the cash. “All or nothing, right?”
“What do you have left, pretty boy?” He said in a silky tone. “You've already put five hundred down.”
Sam scoffed. “Oh, not much....” It was true he only had twenty dollars - but it was a ten dollar bill wrapped around ten ones. “Just one grand.” He set the stack down with the rest of the cash. He knew the guy would be able to match the sum without a problem - the guy was wearing five hundred dollar jeans and a three hundred dollar shirt. “Though I would like to keep a little to pay my tab, if possible.” The guy was probably slumming in this bar looking for an easy lay, if anything.
“I can cough up a thousand dollars, no sweat.” He set his hands on the end of his pool cue and rested his chin on them, looking over the table, as if the money was already laying out in front of him. “That's chump change.” He muttered under his breath. “Unless you want to put that car of yours on the table.”
Sam was glad at that moment that Dean wasn't with him. “The car is not negotiable.” He frowned. “Set 'em up.” He moved to the far end of the table. The way the guy brought up the Impala made him slightly wary.
“You're on.” He chuckled as he put the money into the other side of the table, releasing the game balls and started to arrange them in the triangle. “What year's that Impala?”
“Sixty-seven.” He was going from wary to suspicious - but he knew he couldn't let this guy's talk throw off his game.
“It's a pretty sweet ride.” He said as he sent the cue ball down to Sam and pulled the rack away.
“Yeah, it is.” Sam replied as he lined up his shot and took it, sending the cue ball slamming into the other fifteen, scattering them across the table and sending six of them into the pockets. “I'd appreciate if you'd leave the car out of our conversation.” He straightened up and gave his opponent the barest hint of a triumphant smile.
*
The game was over shortly after that and Sam hadn't wanted to hang around in the neighborhood or the bar afterwards. After winning a pot of fifteen hundred dollars in cash, it was best to get while the getting was good. The way the guy had kept wanting to talk about the Impala had started to make him uncomfortable. With Heaven only knew what and who was after the Winchester brothers, it was a good idea to take off before things got to far. He also drove back north, heading to Shreveport for the night. The more distance he put between himself and New Orleans, the better. As he settled into his hotel room for the night, he reflected that the guy in the bar whose ass he had thoroughly kicked might just be dumb enough to come after him to get his money back - or worse, steal the car. Granted, the last guy who'd come after the Winchesters do to just that had brought along a friend and they had both gotten their asses handed to them on a plate.
Groaning, he fell back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. The sheer thought of kidnapping Dean was starting to weigh in on him. How he and Cas would actually carry it out and not let anyone get hurt - that seemed to be the hardest part... Of course, if they didn't get his brother back, the sheer death toll of the Apocalypse would dwarf the five, at most ten people who might get hurt now.
He set the clock radio on the table that had probably been new in year he was born to for four am - he'd head back to Bobby's place in Sioux Falls. He had a feeling that once they found the place Dean was currently calling home, Cas could pick up his brother up with minimal difficulty. After seeing the angel take on a band of bikers at a bar in San Antonio back in February, his brother shouldn't pose any problem whatsoever.
**
Just on the inside edge of sleeping, Dean had thrown off the covers the bed in a motel room outside of Memphis. Winter, while nearly a month over, had yet to completely yield to the warmth of spring - a chill still hung in the air that had caused him to turn the heat on when he'd first gotten into the room. But it was not the blasting furnace that had caused his legs to kick the blankets into a tangled mess at the foot of the bed. Lying spread eagled, breathing hard, he was currently lost in the most intense dream he could ever recall having. He was just aware of consciousness enough to wonder if it was merely a dream or another of his lost memories. He would actually take it either way - but he would later reflect that he hoped it was the later.
Someone was holding him - their front to his back. They were both naked and his head was thrown back over the other person's shoulder. A deep voice was whispering in his ear - it was the same unfamiliar language he'd heard in other dreams. But the cadence and timbre of the words were absolutely clear. A hand brushed across his face and slid into his hair. “Dean.” His lover was teasing him - he knew that - and he loved it.
His own voice was raspy with raw desire and he struggled to breathe evenly. “Cas... please...” Apparently please was in fact the magic word - for a moment later, he was flat on his back and his companion was kissing him, hard. Despite the fact that he was bigger, the person above him had no trouble holding him down - and for the feel of his hands and lips alone, Dean would surrender himself to this man's mercy without question. It was blinding, it was intense - and when he felt those hands lift his hips from the bed - it all seemed to increase tenfold. He didn't want the dream to end - he wanted it to keep going. The other man was speaking in that strange language again - and one word kept getting repeated over and over. It was a word that wasn't a part of that alien tongue, but his own name.
There was only one thing about this whole dream he found agonizing. He could feel every contour of the man's body, every muscle - every inch of skin under his hands as if it was real and not all in his mind. This wasn't upsetting - far from it. He could feel his lover touching him everywhere - both outside and in - but he could not see his face. Their foreheads were resting against one another and he knew his eyes were open - but the face... the face wasn't there. He wanted something - any small detail would help - his hair color, his eye color - anything - all he was aware of was the faint stubble on the man's cheeks and his soft lips.
The caresses turned less passionate and more comforting. They were now sated and snuggled together under the covers. The person was gently brushing his forehead with his thumb and Dean had the notion he was smiling down at him. He was about to speak when a blaring horn sounded - ending his sleep and his dream.
The first thing he did was curse, rather loudly, not caring if the people in the next room heard him or not. Dean sat up and ran his hands through his hair. He hadn't had any dreams like this one before - the few he'd had all involved an endless road or that horrifying place that, the more he thought on it, had to be Hell - for there was no place on Earth that it could be. Unless he spent time in his youth doing LSD in Death Valley. He didn't want to think he was gay - or bi, or what - the only reason he'd not looked at any women in the past few months was the lingering possibility that he might be married - and just lost his wedding ring. Of course, he would hope that if he was married his wife would have looked for him. But that line of thought always brought him full circle back to the woods he came out of and the shotgun. Something had happened out there in that woody copse and whatever it was, it had sent him spiraling into this life he now lived.
Of course, should the dream ever repeat itself, Dean wouldn't object - he just hoped that a horn wouldn't wake him again. He gritted his teeth as his cock jerked, letting him know that while he had finished in slumber-land - here, in reality, he was still hard. He reached down and pulled the blankets over him, feeling the need to keep covered even though he was alone in the room. He bent his legs and removed his sleep pants and boxers, tossing them to the floor. The sheets were scratchy against his skin, but he didn't care - it wasn't the first time he'd been naked in a hotel bed - and it was highly unlikely it'd be the last. Taking his cock in his hand, he closed his eyes and started to stroke up and down his length. As he lay there, he once again wished he had a face to go with the dream he'd had. All he had was a name and a voice - and for some reason, that was enough. Hell, the voice alone made him replete with desire. He could still hear it, whispering the words he did not know in his ear as he pumped himself harder and faster. With a strangled gasp, Dean came. As he lay there, listening to his own harsh breathing, he heard the voice say something in his mind's ear again - and found himself understanding the single phrase in the language he couldn't name.
I love you.
*
Castiel sat on the floor of the room Dean used at Bobby's house. He was naked save for his pants and Dean's amulet. His head slowly tilted forward, his shoulders slumped. The sigils he'd carved into the Winchester's rib cages kept him and all angels from finding them in reality - but for the first time in four months, he'd found Dean in the dream world. It hadn't been easy and it was taxing his already rapidly depleting grace, but it had been worth it. True, he still had no idea where the hunter was sleeping tonight - but the memory he'd shared with him - he hoped it let the man sleep easier afterwards. The angel wasn't sure what the future of all this would be, even if they could even make Dean remember his past.
Glad that he was alone in the upstairs of the house, he leaned forward onto his hands, breathing hard. Squinting in the darkness, he could make out the door and see that he had locked it when he came in here. The urge to crawl into the bed behind him was strong - but, just like the other times he'd sat here, without either Sam or Bobby ever knowing, he held himself back. The last thing he wanted was for the sheets to become dirty - requiring someone, most likely him, to wash them. Instead, he rose up onto his knees and pulled the pillow from the head of the bed down to where he was. This was something he hadn't done before, but the ache in his groin and the memory shared was to fresh in his mind.
It was rather a surprise to him, that he'd gone four whole months keeping this sort of thing repressed. As he became more and more human, Cas had started to notice things that before he'd never given a second thought to. Time, however, was something he still never took notice of until he stopped and looked around for a few moments. It had been that way back in October, the last time he'd stopped to take stock. Dean had still been with him then and he'd remarked that there were Christmas decorations everywhere and asked, rather stupidly, if it was December already. Dean had chuckled gently, kissed him on the forehead, both cheeks and on the lips - and then told him that stores tended to start cramming the winter holidays down the throats of consumers as soon as they'd cleared out the back-to-school things. He'd not understood the motivation or the point of such a thing, the holiday would come regardless of when they started to inform mankind. He was about to mention it when Dean had smiled at him - that playful, teasing smile that he once hated and now loved - and the rest of the conversation had gone out the window. While he didn't remember the rest of the conversation - Cas was aware that that had been the sixth time they'd slept together.
He quietly removed the rest of his clothing, adding his pants and boxers to the neatly folded stack that was on the floor next to him. Turning back to the bed, he leaned forward, burying his head in the pillow that probably was new fifteen years ago, at least. He didn't care about that - it was the scent clinging to it that mattered. Dean hadn't slept in this bed in nearly five months - but the blankets, the sheets, the pillow - it all smelled of Dean. With his senses being overwhelmed by the intoxicating aroma he'd not let himself indulge in until now. With one hand clutching the bed-covers and wrapping the other around his cock, he let the feeling settle over him. As he knelt there, pumping himself, the pillow muffling his soft moans, Castiel let his mind go to where it wanted - and somehow, with the fragrance that was thick in his nostrils, the memory of what he'd shared with Dean via the world of dreams and the memory of the times it hadn't been a dream, the angel can almost - almost - forget he's alone in the room. Minutes later, when his world explodes around him in a haze of pleasure, his free hand grasps outward, seeking someone who isn't there.
He heard himself whimper once before he slumped to the floor, his head landing on his pile of clothes - hating the fact that despite how good he should feel - he feels very much alone.
**
Sam settled into a booth at the truck stop outside of Shreveport. It was a fourteen hour drive back to Sioux Falls and he was determined to get back to South Dakota today. A decent breakfast and he'd be off. To tell the truth, he'd had no idea that the places that truckers frequented had such much good food at such Winchester-friendly prices. He guessed that was just another way of proving that you learned something new every day. Though it seemed to be a discovery made far to late - when he and Cas got Dean back, they probably couldn't frequent them often, if at all. His brother was the type of person that probably everyone in this business knew by now. For all his abrasive behavior, Dean had the ability to make people like him - or hate his guts. Sam also had that kind of personality - though he tended more towards the likability factor rather than the other way around.
“Good mornin.” The waitress said as she set a glass of water down and some silverware rolled up in a paper napkin. “How are we today?”
“Not bad.” Sam said.
“What can I get you to drink?” She handed him the menu.
“Coffee, please.”
“Not a problem. You need a few minutes?”
“Yeah.” He said, picking up the menu and flipping it over to the daily specials.
“Okay.” She scribbled down the drink order and left.
With his head resting in his hand, Sam felt like he was almost in a bad repeat of yesterday morning - only this time, Dean wouldn't be appearing in the next booth. Experience had taught him that Winchesters were never that lucky. After scanning over the menu and when the waitress brought his coffee, he ordered eggs and bacon. When she left, he immediately flipped open his laptop, relieved he'd once again been seated someplace where his back was to a wall and he could scan the rest of the room. Cas had told him the name he recalled seeing on the side of Dean's rig - the name of the company his brother was now working for. It didn't take him long to find the website and he knew it wouldn't take him very long to hack into the employee database and find the place Dean was now calling home. By the time his breakfast had been set on the table and he'd finished half of it, he'd made the progress he needed to - the only trouble was, there were two Deans working for Larkspur Hauling - and they were both the same age. Dean Smith had a birthday listed as January first and Dean Morgan had a birthday of May seventeenth. This, he reflected wouldn't be to big of a problem if they had pictures listed in their database. But it didn't help that both men were listed as being the same height, nearly the same weight, single, each with one tattoo, one was listed as having hazel eyes and the other as green and they had the same hair color. Not to mention that they both had started working for Larkspur in January. The only difference between them, at least according to the computer was their birth date and place of residence. Smith called Williamsburg, Kentucky home and Morgan resided in a town called Corbin in the same state. “Shit.” He said softly into his coffee mug. He was hoping that one of them lived in a state other than the one where he'd been separated from his brother, thus eliminating him. After taking a quick look on Mapquest, Sam nearly gagged on his coffee. The towns neighbored each other - and both were about equal distance of where he and Cas had lost Dean.
He finished eating his breakfast and drained the last of his water. It was a fourteen hour drive to Sioux Falls from here - and he wanted to be back there as soon as possible. He shut his laptop and dropped a ten dollar bill on the tab the waitress had left when the place had started to fill up with customers. As he made his way out of the truck stop and back to the Impala, he reflected that at least one Dean didn't live in Texas and the other in Maine. That would just make matters worse. He'd take a closer look at the records when he got to Bobby's house. Maybe, just maybe - one of the two men had something that would mark him as his brother. Because there's no way both of them have a huge burn scar in the shape of a hand on their arms.
As he sat down in the driver's seat, he checked his watch - it was just after eight. In that moment, he made the split decision not to head back to South Dakota. He was going to go to Kentucky and at least find out which of the two Deans was his brother - and this time when he found him, he had to tell him the truth. He started up the car and pulled away from the truck stop, heading for Interstate Twenty which would take him east, instead of Twenty-Nine, which would take him north. He'd call Bobby when he stopped for gas in a few hours. He was going to find his brother first thing tomorrow morning - and find a way to get him back in the game. Sam had a feeling that despite the seriousness of the situation, his father was laughing in the great beyond at the irony of him being the one who needed to get Dean back up to speed - instead of the other way around.
**
Dean was relieved to be home. Thankfully, he had not had another one of the 'memory attacks' as he dubbed them - at least, not while he was awake. As he slumped back onto his bed at the Mayfleet farmhouse, the faint smell of lavender wafted around him. He had driven here to Williamsburg straight from Memphis first thing this morning. As he was effectively 'off duty' for the next three days - after which he'd drive the long trek to San Francisco. He'd only gotten six hours of sleep last night and with the time off, he was looking forward to a long night's sleep tonight. It was always nice to come back to the farm. Shannon had been thrilled, as always, at his safe return. The woman worried about him like he was her own son. How a person could be so kind towards a total stranger that had first seemed a mystery had started to rub off on him and he was rather proud of it.
The wonderful smell of dinner was winding it's way through the house, a glorious mixture of fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy. He had three whole days before he'd leave again and he intended to enjoy every last minute. He also knew that there were a few things around the house that needed taken care of. Door hinges that needed to be oiled, windows that needed to be washed. Shannon wanted to air the house out after the long winter and quite frankly, Dean didn't want a sixty-two year old woman doing that all by herself. It'd be grueling, cumbersome and monotonous, but at the end, they'd have something to show for it. And he really didn't care about collapsing into bed each night worn out from the work. He had come to the conclusion that helping people, which came very naturally to him, must be a part of his personality, given how fast he'd started doing it. This was actually a source of great comfort to him, reassuring him that he wasn't really an asshole.
He closed his eyes, intending to just rest for a few minutes and let the fatigue of the road fade a little. When he did, his thoughts instantly drifted to his past. Just like all the other times he did this, he saw nothing but two lane back-top. The destination and direction were unknown. He knew he was the one driving and the car was much lower to the ground than a rig. He was also aware that there was someone else in the car with him. The road looked like nothing more than a ribbon, winding its way around curves and over small creeks and rivers. They came to a wide expanse of farmland, with soybeans growing on either side of the road, the fields stretching out to an almost unfathomable distance. It was almost tranquil.
Dean pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and more details became clear. The car's interior - it was black - just like the car itself was black. There was a smell of salt and Armor-All upholstery cleaner. The heat was on in the car and an odd rattling sound came from the dashboard, like something was stuck just below it.
“Dean?” The voice next to him said. “Dean you haven't said a word since we left.”
“Don't feel like talking Sammy.” He replied.
Lowering his hands and opening his eyes, something clicked into place in his mind. He had a brother - a younger brother. He had a brother named Sam. Groaning softly, he rolled over on the bed and put his feet on the floor. The fact that he had a brother should floor him, that he could remember a family member - but at the same time it made his stomach turn slightly sour.
If I have a brother, then where the hell is he?
He came down into the kitchen and slowly started setting the table, not wanting to bring up his newfound knowledge just yet. He was processing the information in his mind, trying to figure out why his brother wasn't looking for him.
“Dean, we're going to be four for dinner tonight.” Shannon said, her voice absolutely full of a joy he'd never heard in it before. “Luke is finally coming home for a visit.”
He paused as he folded a napkin, looking up. Luke was the Mayfleet's only son - he lived in Paris, or somewhere in Europe. “I didn't know that.” He frowned. “If I'd know that I'd have...”
“Oh, hush.” She said in reply, stirring a pot on the stove. “It's not like there's ever been such a thing as advanced warning with him.” She waved her hand in front of her face. “He showed up three weeks before his due date when he was born... at least this time he called us before he left on the flight across the Atlantic rather than the last time he came home and called us from New York City.”
He managed a nod and went to retrieve another plate from the cupboard. “What does he do in Paris? I don't remember if you told me or not.”
“He works for some clothing designer who thinks wool pants should cost seven hundred dollars just because it's got his name on it.” She shook her head. “Honestly, I'm willing to bet the same sheep that grew the wool for those pants are exactly the same as the ones who produce the wool in the blend yarn I get at JoAnne's Fabrics for six dollars a skein.”
Dean snorted. “Maybe the sheep for the pants all have professional masseurs who also hand-feed them the grass they eat.”
Shannon threw back her head and laughed. “It's quite possible. I'm surprised you didn't notice Harry was gone when you got here this afternoon.”
“I did... I thought he went into town.”
“No, Luke's flying into Knoxville... I wish he would come home more often... but work tends to keep him away from us.”
“I'm sorry to hear that.” He went and got the water glasses from another cupboard. “You also have a daughter, right?”
“Yes, Lexi and her husband live over in Owensbourgh... since their kids got a little older, they've stopped coming for holidays... can't really hide Christmas gifts in the same minivan you're driving. Not to mention there's enough rotten people in the world that if you left a huge pile of gifts under the tree, there's no guarantee they'd be there when you got back.” She shook her head as they both heard a car drive up next to the house. “That will be them.” She wiped her hands off on a dishtowel. “I should warn you, Luke's a little... different.”
Dean, who'd seen pictures of both of the Mayfleet's children and grandchildren tried to imagine what Shannon meant by different. The moment Luke and Harry walked in the door, it was pretty damn obvious what made her say that about her son. If he'd met Luke Mayfleet anywhere on the road, he'd never guess he came from a town in Kentucky that probably barely rated a dot on an atlas. He also figured this was the sort of man who wouldn't be caught dead in a truck stop. He had an aura of sophistication that seemed very out of place in this house. Of course, when he came into the kitchen, Luke didn't even glance at him, he went straight for his mother and caught her in a bear hug.
“Mom, I swear, I've been smelling that fried chicken and following my nose ever since I switched planes in Newark.” He kissed her cheeks. “I'm surprised the pilots and the rest of the passengers weren't following dad and I back here.”
“Glad to see you're palate hasn't been soiled by all that fancy Parisian food.” She gave him a kiss on the forehead. “Did you have a safe flight?”
“It was fine, save for a bit of turbulence over the ocean.” He went back to the laundry room to hang up his jacket.
“I've got a few things to take care of out in the barn.” Harry said, giving a sideways glance at Dean. “I won't be long.”
“Oh, that's fine. Dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes.” She replied as Luke came back, carrying his suitcase. “Luke, this is Dean. We've told you about him.”
Luke set his bag down and shook Dean's hand. “Of course - dad wouldn't shut up about you on the ride here.”
Dean nodded. “Hey.” For some reason, when he took the man's hand, he felt a slight twinge of guilt - rather like the one he'd had when Jill Crowe had bought him that piece of pie outside of Reno - before he found out she was married. Then he had realized her intentions were made in the hopes of friendship, not in something else. But there was something he found unsettling in the glance that Luke Mayfleet had given him. He also wasn't entirely sure if that was much of a problem or not.
**
Sam tossed his duffel bag onto the bed in the motel room. It was late - the drive had been nearly eleven hours long. He quickly dug the smaller bag that held his toiletries and a clean pair of boxers from the duffel. He was going to get cleaned up, call Castiel and then get some sleep. The town was small enough that he half expected the angel would find him before dawn. If he wasn't in town - if he wasn't Dean Smith or if Dean Smith was out on the road, they were going to find him. Even if it meant getting back into the Impala and driving all the way to Anchorage, Alaska. He even made the mental note to himself to make sure to stick the I-Pod jack back in the glove compartment so his brother wouldn't see it and freak out about him 'douching up' his baby.
Author: darth_firefly
Rating: Hard R bordering on NC-17
Genre/pairing: Gen, mentions of Dean/Castiel
Characters: Dean, Sam, Castiel, Bobby
Word count: 8777
Summary: What started out as a comment prompt of: Dean suffers from amnesia and starts living a regular life. He'd get it too, if it weren't for those two crazy stalkers who keep trying to talk to him about demons and fighting ghosts. Sam and Cas keep trying to tell Dean the truth, but he won't believe them when they tell him he's Dean Winchester, because even the cops know that Dean Winchester died two years ago. --> Turned into something more than comment fic.
Spoilers: General spoilers up to Season 5, I suppose.
Warnings: I did not have a beta. I apologize for that. The person who was going to beta hasn't replied in a week and my muse was getting bitchy.
Part One
Dean did not stay the night in New Orleans. After dropping off his shipment, his cab had been hooked up to another trailer that needed to be in Memphis by noon the next day. Eager to close the gap between work and the Mayfleet farm, he'd scarfed down a quick lunch - and headed back north. He didn't want to run the risk of having another vision attack, or whatever it was far from home. Harry Mayfleet wasn't a good long distance driver and as for Shannon? Forget it - the furthest that woman went from the farm was St. Louis. If he had another attack and had to stop driving, he didn't want to think what would happen. Besides, Memphis was a hell of a lot closer than New Orleans to Lexington. As he headed into Mississippi, he thought back to the guy whose breakfast he'd bought.
It wasn't like he had a problem with doing it, not in the slightest. Shannon was fond of saying that there was enough misery in this world and whatever goodwill a person could put back into the human race was welcome. The guy had seemed surprised that he'd done such a thing - maybe he hadn't had enough kindness in his life, or something. Dean rubbed the back of his neck, frowning. There'd also been something in the look he gave him - as if Sam Wesson had known him. Sam Wesson... He frowned. A vague memory of a technical services man at some company came to him - he had also been named Sam Wesson. Perhaps they were one in the same - but as Dean didn't have any records of his past, other than the mismatched fingerprints from some felon who'd died in Colorado, it seemed unlikely. Wesson, while not a very common last name - Sam, on the other hand - seemed to be a somewhat popular first one. Odds were he met the Wesson fellow at the loading dock of that company or something of that nature.
Smith, as far as Dean knew, wasn't his real last name. He'd only chosen to make it his last name because it was common enough that no one would think it was obviously made up. He was fairly certain however that Dean was his first name. He was basing it on the rather upsetting memory of a man, whom he assumed was his father, yelling at him. Damn it, Dean, stop crying! You're eight years old! It's just a fucking scrape! Stop dragging your feet! He gritted his teeth at the memory, just as he had the first time he'd had it. First of all, if this man was his father, he couldn't believe that he'd used coarse language around an eight year old. Secondly, he could remember the wound - it'd not been just a scraped knee, but rather the whole right side of his right calf - he'd slid down a rocky hill and torn half the flesh on his leg off. Hell, that'd make almost anyone cry - especially an eight year old kid.
Maybe his father was just a mean asshole and he, Dean, had gotten his mother's personality instead of his father's. Something also told him that both his parents were dead - and that his mother had died when he was little. He had a feeling that his mom probably wouldn't have put up with anyone talking to her son in the manner his father had talked to him. He figured that if he could somehow remember his birthday - his driver's license stated it was January first, nineteen seventy-nine - then he might be able to find out who he was. After all, how many guys named Dean his age could there be? He'd searched around on the Internet for missing person reports and found nothing. If someone was looking for him, they weren't using mass-media sources.
In that tangent, however, he'd scanned countless fliers in truck stops, weigh stations and in almost every Wal-Mart he went into of missing children. He'd yet to match a face with a missing child, but for some reason, he wanted to find one of those missing kids almost more than anything. He wanted to help some missing child get back to their own home - because home is where they belonged. As the Mayfleets were the only home he knew, he figured that if he could help some missing child, he might be able to find his own way home. He chuckled somewhat amusedly as he pulled into a weigh station, thinking that perhaps Shannon should have given him a Saint Anthony medal instead of Saint Christopher - so that he, a lost person, could be found. With no parents to look for him - that only left friends and younger siblings... if he had any, that is.
“Afternoon.” The man in the small building said over the speaker. “Where you headed?”
“Memphis.” Dean replied. “How are you doing?”
“Not bad, not bad.” He said back to him. “What's in the tanker?”
“Molasses.” He steered the vehicle slowly onto the scale. “How's the weather look up north?”
“Rain, rain and more rain - the front goes from Jackson all the way to Springfield, Illinois.” He made a few adjustments on the computer in front of him. “Okay, you're good.”
“Thanks.” Dean said and slowly pulled away from the scales and back onto the interstate. For some reason, he half expected to see that black Impala show up in his side-view mirror. He wasn't sure what he'd do if it did. As he headed forward on his northward journey, something in his mind jolted into place - a big, black truck. He had a vision of sitting in another car and saw the massive vehicle charge right at him and sudden vanish as if it had been vaporized. It'd happened here, in Mississippi. He snorted at the sheer stupidity of the idea. Things just didn't vanish into thin air. It might just be the memory of some dream that he'd one had, but it seemed very real. He took a sip from the bottle of Coke in his console and tried to ignore it.
But it was like when he watched those cheesy horror movies on television on nights when he wasn't up for pool. He'd watch movies about vampires and think that staking them through the heart wasn't going to do anything more than piss them off - for some reason, he was convinced that you had to cut their heads off and then burn their body. Now why the hell he thought that, he had no idea. Then again, you cut any thing's head off, it was bound to kill them. Except werewolves. Werewolves you had to shoot or stab straight in the heart with silver. At least the horror films seemed to get that right. “What the hell am I thinking about this for?” He laughed at himself. “There's no such thing as vampires or werewolves.” A minute later, he shook his head. “And now I've started talking to myself, that can't be good.” He took another swig of soda and drove in silence for a while longer. Maybe he'd always talked to himself or was used to always having a companion in the car with him - so he'd had someone to talk to. “Maybe I should get a dog.” He shook his head. “Stop talking to yourself Dean, you're going to drive yourself crazier than you already are.”
Chuckling, he hit a few buttons on the radio and found a classic rock station that was blaring a song he recognized as one of Bon Jovi's newer tunes called 'We Weren't Born to Follow'. In lieu of talking to himself, which he was pretty sure wasn't good - he started to sing along with the music in his horrible off-key voice. “This road was paved by the hopeless and the hungry...”
“Bon Jovi?”
“Bon Jovi rocks - on occasion.”
**
Castiel had patiently removed all the guns, ammunition and knives from the panic room in Bobby Singer's basement. After cleaning out the direct weapons, he had removed the other implements, like rope, leather bands and chains. With the storage lockers now empty, the room that was meant to be a safe haven from which a hunter could wage war with practically anything that walked on or below the earth, it now actually looked a little forlorn. The even whump of the ceiling fan far above him was the only sound as he calmly changed the sheets on the bed. They hadn't been changed since Sam had been locked in here the night before he killed Lilith. The angel had very few qualms about locking Dean in here and somehow make his memory snap back into place. He wasn't quite ready to go find Gabriel and beg the archangel to cure Dean. It wasn't that he doubted his elder brother would do it - but the cost for that caliber of favor would undoubtedly be high. Castiel had a feeling it would be automatic two automatic 'yeses' from Sam and Dean to Lucifer and Michael. The thought of that alone made him try and put the idea out of his mind. It also made him wish they had a plan D.
Checking all the cabinets one last time, he went to the door, turned the lights out and headed back up the stairs. Bobby was almost exactly where he'd left him a few hours earlier, sitting behind his desk, pouring through a book - the only thing that had changed was the book he was reading and the very worried expression on the man's face. “It is ready.”
“This ain't going to work.” The hunter shook his head. “This spell on repressed memories.” He tossed down the pencil he was holding. “Not unless you can play Sherlock Holmes and Jim Bridger at the same time and find the damn rock or the exact spot where Dean fell. We need something from that precise area as a component.”
“Perhaps being among what should be familiar will be enough.” He walked towards the window and looked out at the salvage yard, the flood lights casting halos of light where the stood. He wasn't looking at them - he looked at the shadows between them, searching for any hidden danger. “As long as Sam can find where he now calls home.”
“The human mind is a complex thing, Cas.” Bobby said, wheeling himself away from his desk and into the kitchen to retrieve another bottle of beer.
“I am aware of that, Mr. Singer.” He slowly turned back towards him.
“You sure you don't have any way of curing him?”
“No.” He replied flatly and went to sit on the couch.
“And you're also certain that this isn't one of your family member's doing?”
“Positive. If Zachariah was behind this, Dean would have already said yes to Michael.”
“Damn it.” Bobby said under his breath as he came back into the room. “Just out of curiosity, the angels couldn't resurrect Adam Milligan to make him Lucifer's vessel, could they?”
“No. If the angels needed to resurrect Adam, it would be to make him Michael's vessel. While he is John Winchester's youngest son, his is Kate Milligan's oldest and only.”
“You have any idea how insane that sounds?”
The angel gave him an odd look, tilting his head to one side. “Do you have any idea how insane the Normandy Invasion sounded to me when I first heard it?”
The hunter raised his eyebrows. “Surely you knew that was going to work.”
“I did not. Contrary to what you may believe or think, I am not omnipotent. I never doubted that the Allied forces would win the Second World War, I just did not think it would happen as swiftly as it did.”
“You call a war that was seven years long swift?” Bobby was counting all of the war, just not America's involvement.
“Compared to the wars of Europe in the earlier part of the last millennium, yes.” He picked up one of the books that was lying on the coffee table in front of him and slowly started to leaf through it.
Bobby shook his head and wheeled himself back to his desk. “You have a point. Are there any other plans that mankind has carried out that sounded crazy the first time you heard them?”
Cas found the man's attempt at sarcasm strongly reminiscent of Dean. “I believed the American Colonies were foolhardy to challenge what at the time was the most powerful empire on earth for their Independence.”
“Cas - you have a lot of doubts for someone who is supposed to be divine.”
“Doubt in concerns of the ways of men is not forbidden. Heaven does not take sides in the wars of men. If we did, then the Crusades would not have failed.”
Bobby looked down into half-empty bottle. “If we're going to keep this conversation up, I'm going to need something a hell of a lot stronger than this.”
**
As Castiel did not require sleep, he spent the night sitting at the kitchen table, staring at the six filled shot glasses in front of him like they were nothing. That's because six shots weren't nearly enough to get him mildly drunk. He doubted the whole bottle of tequila would be enough to get him even halfway there. Not that he really wanted to be anyway... He took a deep breath and knocked back all six shots and added a seventh glass. Seven shots for the seven brothers and sisters that Uriel had killed in his quest to free Lucifer. Seven siblings who had died in vain. Looking back now, he can see that it made no sense. He and all angels of his rank were given the same instruction save the seals at any cost. It was nearly a year ago that he had rebelled against Heaven's will. A will that he now saw most certainly didn't benefit anyone but the angels - even if things went the wrong way - they would seek haven elsewhere. They would go to a place where vessels weren't needed and they could walk on the surface of some distant planet undisturbed, letting mankind burn in their absence.
Love mankind more than you love Me - the single instruction given to angels regarding humans from God. Or so he was told - he'd never met the man, he'd received the edict from Michael eons ago. You didn't argue with your superiors - least of all an archangel. So he obeyed - and then rebelled against his family for the sake of mankind. Isn't that just the sort of thing that testifies to loving humans?
He looked at the upside-down glasses, resisting the urge to shatter them. Maybe this was just another human emotion he was starting to feel and this one wasn't a pleasant one. He had at best, managed to get a decent grasp on one feeling - friendship and, until Dean's disappearance, had been getting a good sense of love that was more amorous and less camaraderie. This new feeling he could name and he hated it with a passion. He hated that he knew what it was and that he was feeling it.
Jealousy.
He had known Dean was alive, but not the circumstances. He did not like them and he was having trouble with waiting to change it. Perhaps when it was over he might find the way to express the thoughts in his head - the unrelenting feeling that made him want to scream. To know that someone other than him had been there - someone else had put the hunter back up on his feet. There was someone or more than one person who was helping him heal the wounds. If it was Sam, he knew he wouldn't be this way. Sam was his brother and, being a brother himself - knew better than to mess with the bonds of siblings. The one between the two Winchesters was, without a doubt, among the strongest he'd ever seen. He couldn't think of a pair of angels who were as close as Sam and Dean. Hell, if it was Sam who'd found Dean, Cas knew that he'd also have a part in it.
For now, all he could do was wait. Waiting was actually one of the things angels did very, very well. He could remember waiting for countless events in human history. Some he had looked forward to with all the expectation and hope that a child had for Christmas. He can remember waiting for the first Christmas, a memory now that had gone bittersweet. He closed his eyes, remembering that night. His whole garrison, led by Anna, had taken human vessels and had been in Bethlehem. He can remember coming back to Heaven with a sense of wonder that he'd never felt. If he, an Angel of the Lord had been nearly overcome, it was nothing short of miraculous that those shepherds he and a few other angels had visited were able to walk. It was a sense of change in mankind he would not feel again for nearly fifteen hundred years when Columbus sailed to the Americas and unknowingly set this whole plan now unfolding in human history into motion. Waiting was a natural part of being an angel - and also one of the hardest.
He looked back down at the shot glasses and carefully stacked them together and took them over to the sink, with the tiniest fraction of a stagger. After placing them down slowly, he turned the faucet on and when the water was hot, he started to clean them as well as the rest of the dishes stacked in the sink. It was one of the few tasks he could do for Bobby. It also helped pass the time.
**
Sam both lauded and lamented the lack of smoking in bars. It was rather pleasant not to reek of smoke for hours after being in said bar. Not to mention that even when it'd been bellow freezing Dean had insisted on driving with at least two of the windows down so the scent wouldn't become ingrained in the Impala's leather interior. The real problem was that now you found out just out how many other unpleasant smells that smoke had been covering up. Whereas once the places he and his brother had frequented had just reeked with a myriad of cigarettes and cigars and the occasional pipe, now there was the sickly sweet smell of cheap perfume, even cheaper cologne, beer and more often than not, body odor that was just short of nauseating. Perhaps to the normal person these scents would make one sick, but as he was familiar with the reek of blood, decay and burning flesh - he had a higher tolerance for bad smelling people. At least none of them smelled like sulfur or death - quite possibly the two worst scents in existence... and the last two you wanted to encounter in combination with each other.
For tonight, however, the worst smell Sam had to deal with was the man standing across from him - he reeked of some imitation aftershave. What made it more funny than sick was the fact that the man needed to shave - or make up his mind if he was going to have a goatee or a full face beard. Right now the guy looked like a Civil War movie reject - he looked a cross between Jeff Daniels in Gettysburg and Chuck Shurley. Doing his best not to laugh and ignore the absurdity of it, he turned his attention back to the pool game he was losing on purpose. He'd picked this bar in New Orleans purely for the classic metal rock covers by the band in the corner that, if they played any louder, they might be able to mask the stench of bad perfume with sound. Sam had a feeling that a little thing like amnesia wouldn't change his brother's taste in music. He didn't count the time that Zachariah had screwed with their heads in order to make them realize they were meant to be hunters and not nine-to-five workers.
Right now, however, he turned his full attention to the game as his opponent sank the eight ball in the corner pocket. This marked the third game he'd lost to the guy, the pot of five hundred dollars jammed underneath an upside-down pilsner glass. It was time to stop playing the bungling novice who'd just 'played a few games in college' and start playing the pool shark he was. He'd played his first game of pool at the age of five - and at the age of eleven, won fifty dollars in a game against a college student at some tavern in Idaho whose name he didn't remember. The only real problem was that all he had left in terms of cash was twenty dollars - that already belonged to the bar for the few beers he'd drunk.
“You up for another round?” The lean man folded his arms, grinning at him.
“Sure...” He leaned against the table, idly staring at the cash. “All or nothing, right?”
“What do you have left, pretty boy?” He said in a silky tone. “You've already put five hundred down.”
Sam scoffed. “Oh, not much....” It was true he only had twenty dollars - but it was a ten dollar bill wrapped around ten ones. “Just one grand.” He set the stack down with the rest of the cash. He knew the guy would be able to match the sum without a problem - the guy was wearing five hundred dollar jeans and a three hundred dollar shirt. “Though I would like to keep a little to pay my tab, if possible.” The guy was probably slumming in this bar looking for an easy lay, if anything.
“I can cough up a thousand dollars, no sweat.” He set his hands on the end of his pool cue and rested his chin on them, looking over the table, as if the money was already laying out in front of him. “That's chump change.” He muttered under his breath. “Unless you want to put that car of yours on the table.”
Sam was glad at that moment that Dean wasn't with him. “The car is not negotiable.” He frowned. “Set 'em up.” He moved to the far end of the table. The way the guy brought up the Impala made him slightly wary.
“You're on.” He chuckled as he put the money into the other side of the table, releasing the game balls and started to arrange them in the triangle. “What year's that Impala?”
“Sixty-seven.” He was going from wary to suspicious - but he knew he couldn't let this guy's talk throw off his game.
“It's a pretty sweet ride.” He said as he sent the cue ball down to Sam and pulled the rack away.
“Yeah, it is.” Sam replied as he lined up his shot and took it, sending the cue ball slamming into the other fifteen, scattering them across the table and sending six of them into the pockets. “I'd appreciate if you'd leave the car out of our conversation.” He straightened up and gave his opponent the barest hint of a triumphant smile.
*
The game was over shortly after that and Sam hadn't wanted to hang around in the neighborhood or the bar afterwards. After winning a pot of fifteen hundred dollars in cash, it was best to get while the getting was good. The way the guy had kept wanting to talk about the Impala had started to make him uncomfortable. With Heaven only knew what and who was after the Winchester brothers, it was a good idea to take off before things got to far. He also drove back north, heading to Shreveport for the night. The more distance he put between himself and New Orleans, the better. As he settled into his hotel room for the night, he reflected that the guy in the bar whose ass he had thoroughly kicked might just be dumb enough to come after him to get his money back - or worse, steal the car. Granted, the last guy who'd come after the Winchesters do to just that had brought along a friend and they had both gotten their asses handed to them on a plate.
Groaning, he fell back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. The sheer thought of kidnapping Dean was starting to weigh in on him. How he and Cas would actually carry it out and not let anyone get hurt - that seemed to be the hardest part... Of course, if they didn't get his brother back, the sheer death toll of the Apocalypse would dwarf the five, at most ten people who might get hurt now.
He set the clock radio on the table that had probably been new in year he was born to for four am - he'd head back to Bobby's place in Sioux Falls. He had a feeling that once they found the place Dean was currently calling home, Cas could pick up his brother up with minimal difficulty. After seeing the angel take on a band of bikers at a bar in San Antonio back in February, his brother shouldn't pose any problem whatsoever.
**
Just on the inside edge of sleeping, Dean had thrown off the covers the bed in a motel room outside of Memphis. Winter, while nearly a month over, had yet to completely yield to the warmth of spring - a chill still hung in the air that had caused him to turn the heat on when he'd first gotten into the room. But it was not the blasting furnace that had caused his legs to kick the blankets into a tangled mess at the foot of the bed. Lying spread eagled, breathing hard, he was currently lost in the most intense dream he could ever recall having. He was just aware of consciousness enough to wonder if it was merely a dream or another of his lost memories. He would actually take it either way - but he would later reflect that he hoped it was the later.
Someone was holding him - their front to his back. They were both naked and his head was thrown back over the other person's shoulder. A deep voice was whispering in his ear - it was the same unfamiliar language he'd heard in other dreams. But the cadence and timbre of the words were absolutely clear. A hand brushed across his face and slid into his hair. “Dean.” His lover was teasing him - he knew that - and he loved it.
His own voice was raspy with raw desire and he struggled to breathe evenly. “Cas... please...” Apparently please was in fact the magic word - for a moment later, he was flat on his back and his companion was kissing him, hard. Despite the fact that he was bigger, the person above him had no trouble holding him down - and for the feel of his hands and lips alone, Dean would surrender himself to this man's mercy without question. It was blinding, it was intense - and when he felt those hands lift his hips from the bed - it all seemed to increase tenfold. He didn't want the dream to end - he wanted it to keep going. The other man was speaking in that strange language again - and one word kept getting repeated over and over. It was a word that wasn't a part of that alien tongue, but his own name.
There was only one thing about this whole dream he found agonizing. He could feel every contour of the man's body, every muscle - every inch of skin under his hands as if it was real and not all in his mind. This wasn't upsetting - far from it. He could feel his lover touching him everywhere - both outside and in - but he could not see his face. Their foreheads were resting against one another and he knew his eyes were open - but the face... the face wasn't there. He wanted something - any small detail would help - his hair color, his eye color - anything - all he was aware of was the faint stubble on the man's cheeks and his soft lips.
The caresses turned less passionate and more comforting. They were now sated and snuggled together under the covers. The person was gently brushing his forehead with his thumb and Dean had the notion he was smiling down at him. He was about to speak when a blaring horn sounded - ending his sleep and his dream.
The first thing he did was curse, rather loudly, not caring if the people in the next room heard him or not. Dean sat up and ran his hands through his hair. He hadn't had any dreams like this one before - the few he'd had all involved an endless road or that horrifying place that, the more he thought on it, had to be Hell - for there was no place on Earth that it could be. Unless he spent time in his youth doing LSD in Death Valley. He didn't want to think he was gay - or bi, or what - the only reason he'd not looked at any women in the past few months was the lingering possibility that he might be married - and just lost his wedding ring. Of course, he would hope that if he was married his wife would have looked for him. But that line of thought always brought him full circle back to the woods he came out of and the shotgun. Something had happened out there in that woody copse and whatever it was, it had sent him spiraling into this life he now lived.
Of course, should the dream ever repeat itself, Dean wouldn't object - he just hoped that a horn wouldn't wake him again. He gritted his teeth as his cock jerked, letting him know that while he had finished in slumber-land - here, in reality, he was still hard. He reached down and pulled the blankets over him, feeling the need to keep covered even though he was alone in the room. He bent his legs and removed his sleep pants and boxers, tossing them to the floor. The sheets were scratchy against his skin, but he didn't care - it wasn't the first time he'd been naked in a hotel bed - and it was highly unlikely it'd be the last. Taking his cock in his hand, he closed his eyes and started to stroke up and down his length. As he lay there, he once again wished he had a face to go with the dream he'd had. All he had was a name and a voice - and for some reason, that was enough. Hell, the voice alone made him replete with desire. He could still hear it, whispering the words he did not know in his ear as he pumped himself harder and faster. With a strangled gasp, Dean came. As he lay there, listening to his own harsh breathing, he heard the voice say something in his mind's ear again - and found himself understanding the single phrase in the language he couldn't name.
I love you.
*
Castiel sat on the floor of the room Dean used at Bobby's house. He was naked save for his pants and Dean's amulet. His head slowly tilted forward, his shoulders slumped. The sigils he'd carved into the Winchester's rib cages kept him and all angels from finding them in reality - but for the first time in four months, he'd found Dean in the dream world. It hadn't been easy and it was taxing his already rapidly depleting grace, but it had been worth it. True, he still had no idea where the hunter was sleeping tonight - but the memory he'd shared with him - he hoped it let the man sleep easier afterwards. The angel wasn't sure what the future of all this would be, even if they could even make Dean remember his past.
Glad that he was alone in the upstairs of the house, he leaned forward onto his hands, breathing hard. Squinting in the darkness, he could make out the door and see that he had locked it when he came in here. The urge to crawl into the bed behind him was strong - but, just like the other times he'd sat here, without either Sam or Bobby ever knowing, he held himself back. The last thing he wanted was for the sheets to become dirty - requiring someone, most likely him, to wash them. Instead, he rose up onto his knees and pulled the pillow from the head of the bed down to where he was. This was something he hadn't done before, but the ache in his groin and the memory shared was to fresh in his mind.
It was rather a surprise to him, that he'd gone four whole months keeping this sort of thing repressed. As he became more and more human, Cas had started to notice things that before he'd never given a second thought to. Time, however, was something he still never took notice of until he stopped and looked around for a few moments. It had been that way back in October, the last time he'd stopped to take stock. Dean had still been with him then and he'd remarked that there were Christmas decorations everywhere and asked, rather stupidly, if it was December already. Dean had chuckled gently, kissed him on the forehead, both cheeks and on the lips - and then told him that stores tended to start cramming the winter holidays down the throats of consumers as soon as they'd cleared out the back-to-school things. He'd not understood the motivation or the point of such a thing, the holiday would come regardless of when they started to inform mankind. He was about to mention it when Dean had smiled at him - that playful, teasing smile that he once hated and now loved - and the rest of the conversation had gone out the window. While he didn't remember the rest of the conversation - Cas was aware that that had been the sixth time they'd slept together.
He quietly removed the rest of his clothing, adding his pants and boxers to the neatly folded stack that was on the floor next to him. Turning back to the bed, he leaned forward, burying his head in the pillow that probably was new fifteen years ago, at least. He didn't care about that - it was the scent clinging to it that mattered. Dean hadn't slept in this bed in nearly five months - but the blankets, the sheets, the pillow - it all smelled of Dean. With his senses being overwhelmed by the intoxicating aroma he'd not let himself indulge in until now. With one hand clutching the bed-covers and wrapping the other around his cock, he let the feeling settle over him. As he knelt there, pumping himself, the pillow muffling his soft moans, Castiel let his mind go to where it wanted - and somehow, with the fragrance that was thick in his nostrils, the memory of what he'd shared with Dean via the world of dreams and the memory of the times it hadn't been a dream, the angel can almost - almost - forget he's alone in the room. Minutes later, when his world explodes around him in a haze of pleasure, his free hand grasps outward, seeking someone who isn't there.
He heard himself whimper once before he slumped to the floor, his head landing on his pile of clothes - hating the fact that despite how good he should feel - he feels very much alone.
**
Sam settled into a booth at the truck stop outside of Shreveport. It was a fourteen hour drive back to Sioux Falls and he was determined to get back to South Dakota today. A decent breakfast and he'd be off. To tell the truth, he'd had no idea that the places that truckers frequented had such much good food at such Winchester-friendly prices. He guessed that was just another way of proving that you learned something new every day. Though it seemed to be a discovery made far to late - when he and Cas got Dean back, they probably couldn't frequent them often, if at all. His brother was the type of person that probably everyone in this business knew by now. For all his abrasive behavior, Dean had the ability to make people like him - or hate his guts. Sam also had that kind of personality - though he tended more towards the likability factor rather than the other way around.
“Good mornin.” The waitress said as she set a glass of water down and some silverware rolled up in a paper napkin. “How are we today?”
“Not bad.” Sam said.
“What can I get you to drink?” She handed him the menu.
“Coffee, please.”
“Not a problem. You need a few minutes?”
“Yeah.” He said, picking up the menu and flipping it over to the daily specials.
“Okay.” She scribbled down the drink order and left.
With his head resting in his hand, Sam felt like he was almost in a bad repeat of yesterday morning - only this time, Dean wouldn't be appearing in the next booth. Experience had taught him that Winchesters were never that lucky. After scanning over the menu and when the waitress brought his coffee, he ordered eggs and bacon. When she left, he immediately flipped open his laptop, relieved he'd once again been seated someplace where his back was to a wall and he could scan the rest of the room. Cas had told him the name he recalled seeing on the side of Dean's rig - the name of the company his brother was now working for. It didn't take him long to find the website and he knew it wouldn't take him very long to hack into the employee database and find the place Dean was now calling home. By the time his breakfast had been set on the table and he'd finished half of it, he'd made the progress he needed to - the only trouble was, there were two Deans working for Larkspur Hauling - and they were both the same age. Dean Smith had a birthday listed as January first and Dean Morgan had a birthday of May seventeenth. This, he reflected wouldn't be to big of a problem if they had pictures listed in their database. But it didn't help that both men were listed as being the same height, nearly the same weight, single, each with one tattoo, one was listed as having hazel eyes and the other as green and they had the same hair color. Not to mention that they both had started working for Larkspur in January. The only difference between them, at least according to the computer was their birth date and place of residence. Smith called Williamsburg, Kentucky home and Morgan resided in a town called Corbin in the same state. “Shit.” He said softly into his coffee mug. He was hoping that one of them lived in a state other than the one where he'd been separated from his brother, thus eliminating him. After taking a quick look on Mapquest, Sam nearly gagged on his coffee. The towns neighbored each other - and both were about equal distance of where he and Cas had lost Dean.
He finished eating his breakfast and drained the last of his water. It was a fourteen hour drive to Sioux Falls from here - and he wanted to be back there as soon as possible. He shut his laptop and dropped a ten dollar bill on the tab the waitress had left when the place had started to fill up with customers. As he made his way out of the truck stop and back to the Impala, he reflected that at least one Dean didn't live in Texas and the other in Maine. That would just make matters worse. He'd take a closer look at the records when he got to Bobby's house. Maybe, just maybe - one of the two men had something that would mark him as his brother. Because there's no way both of them have a huge burn scar in the shape of a hand on their arms.
As he sat down in the driver's seat, he checked his watch - it was just after eight. In that moment, he made the split decision not to head back to South Dakota. He was going to go to Kentucky and at least find out which of the two Deans was his brother - and this time when he found him, he had to tell him the truth. He started up the car and pulled away from the truck stop, heading for Interstate Twenty which would take him east, instead of Twenty-Nine, which would take him north. He'd call Bobby when he stopped for gas in a few hours. He was going to find his brother first thing tomorrow morning - and find a way to get him back in the game. Sam had a feeling that despite the seriousness of the situation, his father was laughing in the great beyond at the irony of him being the one who needed to get Dean back up to speed - instead of the other way around.
**
Dean was relieved to be home. Thankfully, he had not had another one of the 'memory attacks' as he dubbed them - at least, not while he was awake. As he slumped back onto his bed at the Mayfleet farmhouse, the faint smell of lavender wafted around him. He had driven here to Williamsburg straight from Memphis first thing this morning. As he was effectively 'off duty' for the next three days - after which he'd drive the long trek to San Francisco. He'd only gotten six hours of sleep last night and with the time off, he was looking forward to a long night's sleep tonight. It was always nice to come back to the farm. Shannon had been thrilled, as always, at his safe return. The woman worried about him like he was her own son. How a person could be so kind towards a total stranger that had first seemed a mystery had started to rub off on him and he was rather proud of it.
The wonderful smell of dinner was winding it's way through the house, a glorious mixture of fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy. He had three whole days before he'd leave again and he intended to enjoy every last minute. He also knew that there were a few things around the house that needed taken care of. Door hinges that needed to be oiled, windows that needed to be washed. Shannon wanted to air the house out after the long winter and quite frankly, Dean didn't want a sixty-two year old woman doing that all by herself. It'd be grueling, cumbersome and monotonous, but at the end, they'd have something to show for it. And he really didn't care about collapsing into bed each night worn out from the work. He had come to the conclusion that helping people, which came very naturally to him, must be a part of his personality, given how fast he'd started doing it. This was actually a source of great comfort to him, reassuring him that he wasn't really an asshole.
He closed his eyes, intending to just rest for a few minutes and let the fatigue of the road fade a little. When he did, his thoughts instantly drifted to his past. Just like all the other times he did this, he saw nothing but two lane back-top. The destination and direction were unknown. He knew he was the one driving and the car was much lower to the ground than a rig. He was also aware that there was someone else in the car with him. The road looked like nothing more than a ribbon, winding its way around curves and over small creeks and rivers. They came to a wide expanse of farmland, with soybeans growing on either side of the road, the fields stretching out to an almost unfathomable distance. It was almost tranquil.
Dean pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and more details became clear. The car's interior - it was black - just like the car itself was black. There was a smell of salt and Armor-All upholstery cleaner. The heat was on in the car and an odd rattling sound came from the dashboard, like something was stuck just below it.
“Dean?” The voice next to him said. “Dean you haven't said a word since we left.”
“Don't feel like talking Sammy.” He replied.
Lowering his hands and opening his eyes, something clicked into place in his mind. He had a brother - a younger brother. He had a brother named Sam. Groaning softly, he rolled over on the bed and put his feet on the floor. The fact that he had a brother should floor him, that he could remember a family member - but at the same time it made his stomach turn slightly sour.
If I have a brother, then where the hell is he?
He came down into the kitchen and slowly started setting the table, not wanting to bring up his newfound knowledge just yet. He was processing the information in his mind, trying to figure out why his brother wasn't looking for him.
“Dean, we're going to be four for dinner tonight.” Shannon said, her voice absolutely full of a joy he'd never heard in it before. “Luke is finally coming home for a visit.”
He paused as he folded a napkin, looking up. Luke was the Mayfleet's only son - he lived in Paris, or somewhere in Europe. “I didn't know that.” He frowned. “If I'd know that I'd have...”
“Oh, hush.” She said in reply, stirring a pot on the stove. “It's not like there's ever been such a thing as advanced warning with him.” She waved her hand in front of her face. “He showed up three weeks before his due date when he was born... at least this time he called us before he left on the flight across the Atlantic rather than the last time he came home and called us from New York City.”
He managed a nod and went to retrieve another plate from the cupboard. “What does he do in Paris? I don't remember if you told me or not.”
“He works for some clothing designer who thinks wool pants should cost seven hundred dollars just because it's got his name on it.” She shook her head. “Honestly, I'm willing to bet the same sheep that grew the wool for those pants are exactly the same as the ones who produce the wool in the blend yarn I get at JoAnne's Fabrics for six dollars a skein.”
Dean snorted. “Maybe the sheep for the pants all have professional masseurs who also hand-feed them the grass they eat.”
Shannon threw back her head and laughed. “It's quite possible. I'm surprised you didn't notice Harry was gone when you got here this afternoon.”
“I did... I thought he went into town.”
“No, Luke's flying into Knoxville... I wish he would come home more often... but work tends to keep him away from us.”
“I'm sorry to hear that.” He went and got the water glasses from another cupboard. “You also have a daughter, right?”
“Yes, Lexi and her husband live over in Owensbourgh... since their kids got a little older, they've stopped coming for holidays... can't really hide Christmas gifts in the same minivan you're driving. Not to mention there's enough rotten people in the world that if you left a huge pile of gifts under the tree, there's no guarantee they'd be there when you got back.” She shook her head as they both heard a car drive up next to the house. “That will be them.” She wiped her hands off on a dishtowel. “I should warn you, Luke's a little... different.”
Dean, who'd seen pictures of both of the Mayfleet's children and grandchildren tried to imagine what Shannon meant by different. The moment Luke and Harry walked in the door, it was pretty damn obvious what made her say that about her son. If he'd met Luke Mayfleet anywhere on the road, he'd never guess he came from a town in Kentucky that probably barely rated a dot on an atlas. He also figured this was the sort of man who wouldn't be caught dead in a truck stop. He had an aura of sophistication that seemed very out of place in this house. Of course, when he came into the kitchen, Luke didn't even glance at him, he went straight for his mother and caught her in a bear hug.
“Mom, I swear, I've been smelling that fried chicken and following my nose ever since I switched planes in Newark.” He kissed her cheeks. “I'm surprised the pilots and the rest of the passengers weren't following dad and I back here.”
“Glad to see you're palate hasn't been soiled by all that fancy Parisian food.” She gave him a kiss on the forehead. “Did you have a safe flight?”
“It was fine, save for a bit of turbulence over the ocean.” He went back to the laundry room to hang up his jacket.
“I've got a few things to take care of out in the barn.” Harry said, giving a sideways glance at Dean. “I won't be long.”
“Oh, that's fine. Dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes.” She replied as Luke came back, carrying his suitcase. “Luke, this is Dean. We've told you about him.”
Luke set his bag down and shook Dean's hand. “Of course - dad wouldn't shut up about you on the ride here.”
Dean nodded. “Hey.” For some reason, when he took the man's hand, he felt a slight twinge of guilt - rather like the one he'd had when Jill Crowe had bought him that piece of pie outside of Reno - before he found out she was married. Then he had realized her intentions were made in the hopes of friendship, not in something else. But there was something he found unsettling in the glance that Luke Mayfleet had given him. He also wasn't entirely sure if that was much of a problem or not.
**
Sam tossed his duffel bag onto the bed in the motel room. It was late - the drive had been nearly eleven hours long. He quickly dug the smaller bag that held his toiletries and a clean pair of boxers from the duffel. He was going to get cleaned up, call Castiel and then get some sleep. The town was small enough that he half expected the angel would find him before dawn. If he wasn't in town - if he wasn't Dean Smith or if Dean Smith was out on the road, they were going to find him. Even if it meant getting back into the Impala and driving all the way to Anchorage, Alaska. He even made the mental note to himself to make sure to stick the I-Pod jack back in the glove compartment so his brother wouldn't see it and freak out about him 'douching up' his baby.