A Supernatural Musing 4/10
Title: A Supernatural Musing
Topic: Supernatural
Genre: Het, Friendship, Adventure, Horror, Romance
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Castiel, OFC
Pairings: That would be spoilers ;-)
Beta: jooles34
Summary: The Winchester brothers investigate a few supernatural deaths, and quickly discover that there is more to them than meets the eye. Even their guardian Angel, Castiel, is unable to help them, only point them in the right direction. The boys follow that path, and soon find out that there are things more ancient than Heaven, more evil than the Devil, and that the old saying "Women are complicated" barely scratches the surface.
Spoilers: It's set sometime during Season 6, between episodes "Unforgiven" and "Mannequin 3: The Reckoning." Everything before that is fair game for spoilers.
Authors Note: Since I was so late last week, this week I'm posting perfectly on time!
Previous Chapter
He had been staring at the ceiling for five minutes before his alarm went off. The squawk of the motel clock pulled him from inside of his empty mind. There once was a time when Sam would have spent those few minutes thinking about what was to come, and reliving what had already been. But now, the past was too much like his nightmares, and the future was too dangerous. So instead, he just counted the cracks on the ceiling. Those safe, innocent little cracks that accidentally represented his life.
His large hand smashed the top of the alarm before he registered that it was going off, and he rose from the bed, swinging the covers off and stretching before testing out his legs. They were awake enough to carry him, so he shifted his full weight onto them, and his legs took up the responsibility of supporting him for the rest of the day. In the bed next to him, Dean groaned and shifted, his legs and arms deciding they wanted to splay across the small twin bed in a different pattern. Sam rolled his eyes and made his bed. He opened his mouth to tell Dean it was time to wake up, when a streak of mischief took a-hold of him. Sam grabbed one of the books he had been looking through the other day and chucked it at Dean’s head. The hardback hit its mark, and Dean let out a yelp that was borderline feminine.
“Get up, grumpy.” Sam said, chuckling. Dean’s reply was to growl and burry himself even deeper into the covers. Still chuckling, the younger brother grabbed his clothes for the day and carried them with him to the bathroom, opening the door and slipping in. He sat the clothes on the top of the toilet and quickly stripped down to his underwear, grabbing his toothbrush and loading it with paste, pulling back the shower curtain to turn on the water.
As he pulled the plastic curtain back, a surprised yell made it out of his lips and he stumbled a few inches backwards, his free hand moving to his waist, when he remembered that there wasn’t a gun tucked into his boxers.
Shyloh was sitting in the tub.
She was cross-legged, in the exact same pose that she had been in when they first laid eyes on her. Her lips had been moving, but paused now; her eyes cracked open and staring at Sam like he was the one intruding. They stared at each other for a few heartbeats, the silence becoming awkward when Sam remembered that the only piece of clothing he was wearing were his boxers. He shifted uncomfortably, then broke the silence. “What are you doing in the tub?”
“Praying.” she said, so matter-of-factly that for a moment, it didn’t seem strange that she had been praying in the bathroom, sitting in the tub with the lights out Then the reality of the sentence hit Sam, and once again he was confused.
“Yeah, but…why?” he asked, gesturing towards the tub.
Shyloh blinked, almost as if she had to remind herself to. Almost. “I needed a quiet place where I could be alone. Your brother snores.” She took in the look that Sam was giving her. “I don’t understand…don’t you pray?”
“I used to.” He looked away.
“Why’d you stop?” Shyloh asked, her eyes narrowing in on the tattoo that was on Sam’s left collarbone.
Sam felt the burn of her eyes on his skin, and self-consciously crossed his arms, his toothbrush forgotten on the sink, the toothpaste slipping off the bristles and onto the clean white porcelain bowl. “I found out that God wasn’t listening - he didn’t care.”
“That’s not a reason to stop.” she said, and Sam looked at her sharply. There was a depth to her voice right then, and he felt like he had stumbled upon a large piece of the puzzle that made up the strange woman sitting in the shower.
Dean saved him from having to respond by knocking loudly on the door. “Sam! Is Shyloh in there? I can’t find her!”
There was a small amount of panic in his brother’s voice, but Sam didn’t think about that. “Yeah.”
The knocking stopped, and the muttering that Dean was doing wasn’t loud enough to make it through the wooden door clear enough to understand.
“Come on, I need a shower.” Sam said, clearing his throat. He offered his hand for Shyloh to take, and she accepted it firmly, her long, too-skinny arm and pale hand surprising him with the strength behind the grip. He tensed to pull her up but paused. As soon as their skin had touched, a warmth had shot up him arm and spread across his entire body. Their eyes locked. Shyloh’s were huge, staring at him with wonder, shock, and more than a little hint of fear. She didn’t let go, even as the warmth grew uncomfortably hot. His hand felt like it was on fire, but he still couldn’t let go. It was then that he realised he hadn’t even tried to let go. Panicking, he yanked, and drew her up onto her feet. As soon as she was stable he let go, staring at his shaking hand, expecting it to be charred. The heat had disappeared as soon as their skin wasn’t touching anymore. There wasn’t a mark on it. His breath was heavy and unsure, his chest heaving. He glanced up at Shyloh, but in those few moments she had slipped out of the bathroom, and a small slam told him that she had closed the door behind him.
---
She rode in the car with her hands pressed flat against the glass, her nose squished while her mouth made a small round fog shape on the window. Dean had tried to get her to stop, but she had ignored him, so he had stopped complaining. The windows needed washing anyway.
Besides, Dean had more pressing matters to deal with. Like how strange Sam had been behaving he found Shyloh in the shower in the morning. She hadn’t acted any different, but Sam had walked out of there, hair wet and clothes with drops of water, looking like he had seen a ghost. He had barely said a word since. Dean wanted to confront him about it, but didn’t want to say anything in front of Shyloh, because he was pretty sure she was the problem.
“What have you done?” Speaking of the devil.
Dean’s eyes flickered to his rearview mirror, glancing at Shyloh. She was still plastered on the window, her eyes soaking in everything outside. They flew past building after building, large billboards advertising this product and that. He ignored the slight twitch of Sam’s body when she had spoken, and decided to address the question. “Done what?”
She peeled herself away from the glass. “So much metal. It’s all fake. You try to imitate life, but all you do is spread death.” She turned back to the window.
Dean and Sam exchanged a look, and he raised his eyebrow. ‘Ok.’ he mouthed to his younger brother. Sam just shrugged. So she was a hippie Castiel. Alright.
They pulled into the parking lot of the morgue and got out, both of them walking several feet before remembering there was someone else in the car. Dean turned to yell at her for not following, when he remembered that she probably had no idea how to open the door. He had opened it for her at the hotel, and she didn’t have a door handle to jiggle. “Go get her.” Dean gestured at the car then continued walking to cut off any arguing that Sam was planning on implementing. As it was, Sam narrowed his eyes, then hesitantly walked back to the car, his hands deep in his pockets.
Sam opened the passenger door and yanked his seat forward. “There you go.” he said, pressing his lips together in a small smile. Neither would catch the other’s eyes as she climbed out. Shyloh was almost clear of the back seat when her foot caught on the seatbelt and she slipped. Sam reached out to stop her fall before he could think, and once again their skin met. He stood there, awkwardly bent over, ass in the air, arms holding up a five-thousand year old woman, waiting for the fire to burn him again. But there was no strange feeling this time. Just the slight warmth that you feel when coming in contact with another living creature. Sam let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding, and pulled her the rest of the way out. When Shyloh was on her feet she smiled at him. “Thanks Sam.”
She walked off to join Dean, who had watched the entire event unfold, and was staring at Sam with a confused look on his face. It wasn’t until she had walked away that Sam realized his hand had slid to her waist.
He shook his head. Maybe what he had felt that morning was just the accumulation of not enough sleep and running so much. Maybe he had a small flash of his time in hell. Maybe the fact that it started the moment they touched for the first time had nothing to do with it at all. Yeah.
---
Simply put, Dean was really glad that Sam had paid that money for the three of them to have the room by themselves.
Walking into the morgue had been an interesting experience. Sam had gone straight to where the coroner had promised the key would be, and, like he had a feeling of, it was nowhere in sight. Little bitch.
While Sam tried to pick the lock, Dean attempted to calm Shyloh down. As soon as they had entered the large, metal building, she had begun freaking out, muttering about no life and the place reeking of death, which was understandable, seeing where they were. She had reached out, getting her fingertips on everything and leaving prints, going into even more hysterics when nothing she touched had a pulse. Dean had finally grabbed her firmly - but not to tight - and forced her to stare at him until she calmed down. He figured that it was a late reaction to being holed up in a room kind of like this for thousands of years, then getting a taste of freedom. She had calmed down as soon as she had touched him and felt live skin under her fingers. When Sam had triumphantly stood up, the door to the room where the bodies were stored unlocked, Shyloh had decided to grab onto Dean’s hand, and not let go. She had pushed his jacket sleeve up so more bare skin was showing, and Sam could see that Dean was enjoying her holding his hand a little too much. Sam’s stomach had done a strange flip, but he told himself that it was just his paranoia that someone would walk in on them, and had nothing to do with Dean and Shyloh. Nothing at all.
They entered the room, and the temperature in the air dropped suddenly, causing Dean to shiver, and Shyloh to tighten her grip. Sam ignored them and stalked to the drawer where he knew the body was kept. It was supposed to be out on the slab, but apparently the coroner thought that five hundred dollars wasn’t enough to bother with any of the prep work. If it was the last thing he did, Sam would hunt that man down and knock some sense in to him. The least it would do was relieve some of the stress he was feeling. He tugged on the drawer, his muscles straining in his arm as the door failed to yield to his strength. Frowning, he tugged again, this time with both arms. When the door didn’t even moan in protest, he turned to Dean.
“Hey, something isn’t right.”
Frowning, Dean walked over to the door, tugging Shyloh along. “Skipping the gym, Sammy?”
Using one hand, he gently tugged on it, having done this literally hundreds of times before, and knowing how easily these doors slid open. This time, however was different. The door didn’t budge. Frowning, he tugged harder. When it still didn’t give, he let go of Shyloh’s hand and put all his strength behind tugging the metal handle. Nothing.
Shyloh stood there, hugging herself tightly and focusing on the two warm bodies in front of her. She had never been around this much cold and death before. Even when she had been inside the prison, it wasn’t like this. The air didn’t taste like this. She watched them pull with both of their strengths combined, and the door still not move even a centimeter. She rolled her eyes and looked down, staring at her hands and getting an idea. She unwrapped her fingers from her arms and looked at the tattoo that she had etched into her palm herself, then slowly ran over the ones under all ten of her nails. There hadn’t been this strange metal when she was in her prime, but metal had to be made from something, right?
She closed her eyes, focusing on the jumbled memories that the Winchesters’ beloved Castiel had shoved into her brain. She searched for the ones involving metal, and shifted through them at rapid speed. She found what she was looking for, and her eyes fluttered open.
She was on the floor, Dean’s arm around her while Sam’s face hovered over hers, concern in both of their features. She sniffed, and brought her hand to her nose. It came away red. Frowning, she groaned and stood up shakily.
“Shy, you ok?” Dean asked, and she nodded.
“I was searching for something.”
“Did you find it?” Sam asked as Dean shot him a confused look.
She nodded again. “Can I look at the door?”
Dean looked like he was going to argue, but gave up before he started and helped her to the door. She felt so weak. Such a simple task had drained her completely. Time was that she could do something like that while wide awake and fighting off another clansman. Now, though, after five thousand years of being starved of both food and nature, she could only do those kind of childish tasks without damaging her body while asleep.
She reached out to the door, her middle finger on her left hand clicking against the door. She breathed in, then pressed her palm against it. Shyloh breathed out, and pressed against the door.
It clicked open, rolling a few inches them stopping. She smiled and stepped back, allowing the brothers to take over. Sam stared at her, but when her eyes met his they shifted to the tattoos under her fingernails. He opened his mouth, but was cut off by Dean, who had ignored her freaky-ness and opened the door the rest of the way.
“Son-uv-a-bitch!”
“What?” Sam said, tearing his eyes away from her hand.
Dean gestured towards the drawer where the body was suppose to be. “Gone.”
“Son of a bitch.” Sam breathed.
Next Chapter
Topic: Supernatural
Genre: Het, Friendship, Adventure, Horror, Romance
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Castiel, OFC
Pairings: That would be spoilers ;-)
Beta: jooles34
Summary: The Winchester brothers investigate a few supernatural deaths, and quickly discover that there is more to them than meets the eye. Even their guardian Angel, Castiel, is unable to help them, only point them in the right direction. The boys follow that path, and soon find out that there are things more ancient than Heaven, more evil than the Devil, and that the old saying "Women are complicated" barely scratches the surface.
Spoilers: It's set sometime during Season 6, between episodes "Unforgiven" and "Mannequin 3: The Reckoning." Everything before that is fair game for spoilers.
Authors Note: Since I was so late last week, this week I'm posting perfectly on time!
Previous Chapter
He had been staring at the ceiling for five minutes before his alarm went off. The squawk of the motel clock pulled him from inside of his empty mind. There once was a time when Sam would have spent those few minutes thinking about what was to come, and reliving what had already been. But now, the past was too much like his nightmares, and the future was too dangerous. So instead, he just counted the cracks on the ceiling. Those safe, innocent little cracks that accidentally represented his life.
His large hand smashed the top of the alarm before he registered that it was going off, and he rose from the bed, swinging the covers off and stretching before testing out his legs. They were awake enough to carry him, so he shifted his full weight onto them, and his legs took up the responsibility of supporting him for the rest of the day. In the bed next to him, Dean groaned and shifted, his legs and arms deciding they wanted to splay across the small twin bed in a different pattern. Sam rolled his eyes and made his bed. He opened his mouth to tell Dean it was time to wake up, when a streak of mischief took a-hold of him. Sam grabbed one of the books he had been looking through the other day and chucked it at Dean’s head. The hardback hit its mark, and Dean let out a yelp that was borderline feminine.
“Get up, grumpy.” Sam said, chuckling. Dean’s reply was to growl and burry himself even deeper into the covers. Still chuckling, the younger brother grabbed his clothes for the day and carried them with him to the bathroom, opening the door and slipping in. He sat the clothes on the top of the toilet and quickly stripped down to his underwear, grabbing his toothbrush and loading it with paste, pulling back the shower curtain to turn on the water.
As he pulled the plastic curtain back, a surprised yell made it out of his lips and he stumbled a few inches backwards, his free hand moving to his waist, when he remembered that there wasn’t a gun tucked into his boxers.
Shyloh was sitting in the tub.
She was cross-legged, in the exact same pose that she had been in when they first laid eyes on her. Her lips had been moving, but paused now; her eyes cracked open and staring at Sam like he was the one intruding. They stared at each other for a few heartbeats, the silence becoming awkward when Sam remembered that the only piece of clothing he was wearing were his boxers. He shifted uncomfortably, then broke the silence. “What are you doing in the tub?”
“Praying.” she said, so matter-of-factly that for a moment, it didn’t seem strange that she had been praying in the bathroom, sitting in the tub with the lights out Then the reality of the sentence hit Sam, and once again he was confused.
“Yeah, but…why?” he asked, gesturing towards the tub.
Shyloh blinked, almost as if she had to remind herself to. Almost. “I needed a quiet place where I could be alone. Your brother snores.” She took in the look that Sam was giving her. “I don’t understand…don’t you pray?”
“I used to.” He looked away.
“Why’d you stop?” Shyloh asked, her eyes narrowing in on the tattoo that was on Sam’s left collarbone.
Sam felt the burn of her eyes on his skin, and self-consciously crossed his arms, his toothbrush forgotten on the sink, the toothpaste slipping off the bristles and onto the clean white porcelain bowl. “I found out that God wasn’t listening - he didn’t care.”
“That’s not a reason to stop.” she said, and Sam looked at her sharply. There was a depth to her voice right then, and he felt like he had stumbled upon a large piece of the puzzle that made up the strange woman sitting in the shower.
Dean saved him from having to respond by knocking loudly on the door. “Sam! Is Shyloh in there? I can’t find her!”
There was a small amount of panic in his brother’s voice, but Sam didn’t think about that. “Yeah.”
The knocking stopped, and the muttering that Dean was doing wasn’t loud enough to make it through the wooden door clear enough to understand.
“Come on, I need a shower.” Sam said, clearing his throat. He offered his hand for Shyloh to take, and she accepted it firmly, her long, too-skinny arm and pale hand surprising him with the strength behind the grip. He tensed to pull her up but paused. As soon as their skin had touched, a warmth had shot up him arm and spread across his entire body. Their eyes locked. Shyloh’s were huge, staring at him with wonder, shock, and more than a little hint of fear. She didn’t let go, even as the warmth grew uncomfortably hot. His hand felt like it was on fire, but he still couldn’t let go. It was then that he realised he hadn’t even tried to let go. Panicking, he yanked, and drew her up onto her feet. As soon as she was stable he let go, staring at his shaking hand, expecting it to be charred. The heat had disappeared as soon as their skin wasn’t touching anymore. There wasn’t a mark on it. His breath was heavy and unsure, his chest heaving. He glanced up at Shyloh, but in those few moments she had slipped out of the bathroom, and a small slam told him that she had closed the door behind him.
---
She rode in the car with her hands pressed flat against the glass, her nose squished while her mouth made a small round fog shape on the window. Dean had tried to get her to stop, but she had ignored him, so he had stopped complaining. The windows needed washing anyway.
Besides, Dean had more pressing matters to deal with. Like how strange Sam had been behaving he found Shyloh in the shower in the morning. She hadn’t acted any different, but Sam had walked out of there, hair wet and clothes with drops of water, looking like he had seen a ghost. He had barely said a word since. Dean wanted to confront him about it, but didn’t want to say anything in front of Shyloh, because he was pretty sure she was the problem.
“What have you done?” Speaking of the devil.
Dean’s eyes flickered to his rearview mirror, glancing at Shyloh. She was still plastered on the window, her eyes soaking in everything outside. They flew past building after building, large billboards advertising this product and that. He ignored the slight twitch of Sam’s body when she had spoken, and decided to address the question. “Done what?”
She peeled herself away from the glass. “So much metal. It’s all fake. You try to imitate life, but all you do is spread death.” She turned back to the window.
Dean and Sam exchanged a look, and he raised his eyebrow. ‘Ok.’ he mouthed to his younger brother. Sam just shrugged. So she was a hippie Castiel. Alright.
They pulled into the parking lot of the morgue and got out, both of them walking several feet before remembering there was someone else in the car. Dean turned to yell at her for not following, when he remembered that she probably had no idea how to open the door. He had opened it for her at the hotel, and she didn’t have a door handle to jiggle. “Go get her.” Dean gestured at the car then continued walking to cut off any arguing that Sam was planning on implementing. As it was, Sam narrowed his eyes, then hesitantly walked back to the car, his hands deep in his pockets.
Sam opened the passenger door and yanked his seat forward. “There you go.” he said, pressing his lips together in a small smile. Neither would catch the other’s eyes as she climbed out. Shyloh was almost clear of the back seat when her foot caught on the seatbelt and she slipped. Sam reached out to stop her fall before he could think, and once again their skin met. He stood there, awkwardly bent over, ass in the air, arms holding up a five-thousand year old woman, waiting for the fire to burn him again. But there was no strange feeling this time. Just the slight warmth that you feel when coming in contact with another living creature. Sam let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding, and pulled her the rest of the way out. When Shyloh was on her feet she smiled at him. “Thanks Sam.”
She walked off to join Dean, who had watched the entire event unfold, and was staring at Sam with a confused look on his face. It wasn’t until she had walked away that Sam realized his hand had slid to her waist.
He shook his head. Maybe what he had felt that morning was just the accumulation of not enough sleep and running so much. Maybe he had a small flash of his time in hell. Maybe the fact that it started the moment they touched for the first time had nothing to do with it at all. Yeah.
---
Simply put, Dean was really glad that Sam had paid that money for the three of them to have the room by themselves.
Walking into the morgue had been an interesting experience. Sam had gone straight to where the coroner had promised the key would be, and, like he had a feeling of, it was nowhere in sight. Little bitch.
While Sam tried to pick the lock, Dean attempted to calm Shyloh down. As soon as they had entered the large, metal building, she had begun freaking out, muttering about no life and the place reeking of death, which was understandable, seeing where they were. She had reached out, getting her fingertips on everything and leaving prints, going into even more hysterics when nothing she touched had a pulse. Dean had finally grabbed her firmly - but not to tight - and forced her to stare at him until she calmed down. He figured that it was a late reaction to being holed up in a room kind of like this for thousands of years, then getting a taste of freedom. She had calmed down as soon as she had touched him and felt live skin under her fingers. When Sam had triumphantly stood up, the door to the room where the bodies were stored unlocked, Shyloh had decided to grab onto Dean’s hand, and not let go. She had pushed his jacket sleeve up so more bare skin was showing, and Sam could see that Dean was enjoying her holding his hand a little too much. Sam’s stomach had done a strange flip, but he told himself that it was just his paranoia that someone would walk in on them, and had nothing to do with Dean and Shyloh. Nothing at all.
They entered the room, and the temperature in the air dropped suddenly, causing Dean to shiver, and Shyloh to tighten her grip. Sam ignored them and stalked to the drawer where he knew the body was kept. It was supposed to be out on the slab, but apparently the coroner thought that five hundred dollars wasn’t enough to bother with any of the prep work. If it was the last thing he did, Sam would hunt that man down and knock some sense in to him. The least it would do was relieve some of the stress he was feeling. He tugged on the drawer, his muscles straining in his arm as the door failed to yield to his strength. Frowning, he tugged again, this time with both arms. When the door didn’t even moan in protest, he turned to Dean.
“Hey, something isn’t right.”
Frowning, Dean walked over to the door, tugging Shyloh along. “Skipping the gym, Sammy?”
Using one hand, he gently tugged on it, having done this literally hundreds of times before, and knowing how easily these doors slid open. This time, however was different. The door didn’t budge. Frowning, he tugged harder. When it still didn’t give, he let go of Shyloh’s hand and put all his strength behind tugging the metal handle. Nothing.
Shyloh stood there, hugging herself tightly and focusing on the two warm bodies in front of her. She had never been around this much cold and death before. Even when she had been inside the prison, it wasn’t like this. The air didn’t taste like this. She watched them pull with both of their strengths combined, and the door still not move even a centimeter. She rolled her eyes and looked down, staring at her hands and getting an idea. She unwrapped her fingers from her arms and looked at the tattoo that she had etched into her palm herself, then slowly ran over the ones under all ten of her nails. There hadn’t been this strange metal when she was in her prime, but metal had to be made from something, right?
She closed her eyes, focusing on the jumbled memories that the Winchesters’ beloved Castiel had shoved into her brain. She searched for the ones involving metal, and shifted through them at rapid speed. She found what she was looking for, and her eyes fluttered open.
She was on the floor, Dean’s arm around her while Sam’s face hovered over hers, concern in both of their features. She sniffed, and brought her hand to her nose. It came away red. Frowning, she groaned and stood up shakily.
“Shy, you ok?” Dean asked, and she nodded.
“I was searching for something.”
“Did you find it?” Sam asked as Dean shot him a confused look.
She nodded again. “Can I look at the door?”
Dean looked like he was going to argue, but gave up before he started and helped her to the door. She felt so weak. Such a simple task had drained her completely. Time was that she could do something like that while wide awake and fighting off another clansman. Now, though, after five thousand years of being starved of both food and nature, she could only do those kind of childish tasks without damaging her body while asleep.
She reached out to the door, her middle finger on her left hand clicking against the door. She breathed in, then pressed her palm against it. Shyloh breathed out, and pressed against the door.
It clicked open, rolling a few inches them stopping. She smiled and stepped back, allowing the brothers to take over. Sam stared at her, but when her eyes met his they shifted to the tattoos under her fingernails. He opened his mouth, but was cut off by Dean, who had ignored her freaky-ness and opened the door the rest of the way.
“Son-uv-a-bitch!”
“What?” Sam said, tearing his eyes away from her hand.
Dean gestured towards the drawer where the body was suppose to be. “Gone.”
“Son of a bitch.” Sam breathed.
Next Chapter