Who killed Tabaqui (2/?)
Title: Who killed Tabaqui
Author:marlowe78
Rating: PG 13
Characters: Dean, Sam
Word count: a lot
Spoilers: for s6, the basics
Warnings: Language, some blood is spilled.
Summary: Do not mess with Mowgli's brother. You can be pretty sure his teeth are sharp
Chapter 1
He called Bobby. Of course he did, right after Sam’d watched Dean stalk, jump, kill and devour seven huge, ugly, disgusting rats with disturbing speed and gusto. The morbid, black-humor-part of Sam’s brain said it was due payback for all the times Dean had been scared by rats and more payback even for that one time when a sixteen-year-old Dean had been imprisoned in that cave with about hundreds of the little fuckers. The more rational, more Sam-like part of his brain said it was good that Dean seemed to be happy killing rats instead of humans.
Bobby, being the man that he was, yelled at Sam-you-stupid-idjit for about fifteen minutes for not calling him when it happened, for going through this alone, for not asking for backup and told him some other, less helpful things. Until Sam spoke, not too loud, just loud enough to be heard. “So you’d have let him turn and wait? Or would you’ve put a bullet in him?” Silence from the other end. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Sam scratched his head and sighed. “It doesn’t matter. Because right now? I’ve got a huge wolf on my bed that just killed seven rats with more speed than you’d think possible, and the only really evil thing he’s doing is licking his balls.” Bobby laughed and said that not only leopards can’t change their spots, apparently. Sam smiled a bit. “Did I mention he’s doing it on my bed?”
This time when Bobby laughed, Sam laughed right with him. The huge wolf that was his brother stopped licking and grinned, like only a wolf could do, tongue lolling and eyes sparkling.
Without thought, Sam reached over and scratched the animal behind his ear, marveling in the trust the big furball displayed by just dropping to the side and exposing his belly and throat. The coat was warm but rough, not at all nice to the touch. Only on some places was it softer, like behind the ears. Dean groaned in happiness and demanded more scratching with his paw when Sam stopped for a moment.
“So, how’s it possible? How… how is he still … well, kinda my brother?”
Bobby told him he didn’t have a clue, but he’d get right on it and Sam’d better get his and Dean’s asses over to him so they could figure it out. And while they were there, Dean could take care of the rat-infestation in the yard.
Sam chuckled again and hung up. He continued to scratch the wolf until he finally found that magic spot that all canines seemed to have, the one that made the hind-legs twitch automatically. It was fun, and it felt good, and the wolf was warm and furry and alive, and really, if that was how it would be from now on, Sam could live with it. He’d just have to make sure his new friend wouldn’t tear humans apart.
***
“Stay here, ok? I’ll go get something to eat for ya, but you gotta stay here, ok?” he told the wolf - Dean. The wolf cocked his head and grinned, flattening his ears a tiny second like he’d done outside in the woods. Sam took it as a yes and closed the door behind him, hoping nobody would try to break into their room.
When he came back, the huge ball of fur on the bed looked up without moving his head, telling Sam that he’d known it would be him and nobody else, and also telling him that it’d been quiet, if Sam judged the sleeping-position right.
“You hungry, Grey-Brother?”
The wolf’s head shot up the second he caught wind of the smell from the insulation-bag that Sam had deliberated along with an assortment of meat from the butcher at the other side of the town. He put them on different plates - one for the heart, one for the liver, one for the paunch and so on, until he had ten different plates with ten different meats in front of him.
“Ok, I’ll - “ he stopped when he spotted Dean, sitting on Sam’s bed, drooling like a waterfall. “Dude! That’s disgusting!” The wolf looked chastised and ducked, avoiding Sam’s eyes and laying his ears flat. He looked pitiful, not evil at all. “All right, sorry. C’mon, let’s see what you like best”
Dean jumped from the bed and slinked over, lunging at the plate Sam was just preparing to put on the ground. “Ey, wait!” he said and was astonished how fast the wolf obeyed and stepped back. Watching the animal from the corner of his eye, Sam put the other plates in a row on the ground, smiling to himself when he noticed the puddle of drool around his wolf-brother’s paws.
“Ok. Now, look at me” the wolf did. “Go and pick something. Pick one thing. You can’t have all, ok? Take the best, not the first piece, you get that?” The wolf just licked his lips and kept staring at the food. “Right. Ok. Not expecting much, but…ok, right, go and eat.” When the wolf still didn’t move, Sam indicated at the meat with his hand, and like an arrow, the animal was at the plates, sniffing piece after piece thoroughly.
Honestly, Sam had expected that Dean’d choose the heart. It wasn’t a human heart, but it was a heart, and it was fresh.
And Dean did. For a second, it looked like he’d take the paunch, but the lure of the big, bloody muscle seemed to be too much. A bit disappointed, but not as much as he’d feared, Sam put the rest of the stuff into the tiny fridge for tomorrow.
At four in the morning, after a long-needed shower, Sam crawled into bed - Dean’s, not his drool- and fur-covered one - prepared to fall into exhausted sleep. Right before he went under completely, he felt a weight jump on the mattress next to him, heard some scratching and felt some turning - and some more, and more, and more - until the large body dropped close to his side with a grunt and a happy groan, curling into a ball and sighing like only a dog - or apparently a wolf - can to express extreme contentment.
Sam didn’t have the heart to chase the animal away.
***
It was light out when he woke. His body was sore but not much more than after a heavy workout. It was hot in the bed, and somebody was lying next to him, though Dean didn’t recall picking up a girl last night. But there had to be, because he was absolutely certain from the breeze on his more private parts that he was naked.
Not that he recalled much of yesterday at all. There was something… something had happened. Or hadn’t it? And why would he take a girl into his own motel-room, where Sammy might drop in on… Sam?
“Sam?” he croaked. Damn, his voice was wrecked, like he’d been screaming…
With a jolt, Dean was vertical. The werewolf, Sam, the little forest, his gun, turning, the pain - all came crashing in on him and he grabbed his head and moaned in pain and misery. If he was dead, he did want some more time to pretend that he wasn’t in Hell. And if he wasn’t, then he wanted another moment of ignorance before fully waking to the horrors he’d inflicted, before knowing who he’d killed. Before knowing that Sam was dead again. Because he sure as hell wouldn’t be sitting unrestrained if Sam wasn’t dead, right?
“Dean?”
Shit. What?
“Whassup?”
Carefully, not trusting this, Dean turned around and looked. The person next to him wasn’t a girl, and it wasn’t a dead, ripped-apart thing either. It was Sam, healthy and bleary-eyed, looking at him with his hair sticking up and around in weird angles. Dean scrambled around to grab a sheet and cover up his nakedness.
“You’a’ight?” the Sam-thing asked, and it was a good question, considering they were sharing a bed which hadn’t happened that often since childhood. Dean blinked. And again.
Something… there was something stuck in his mouth. And, now that he thought of it, his mouth tasted like crap. Like… blood.
“Sam…” he croaked again. “What…what did I do? What did… what happened?”
Sam smacked his lips like he, too, had something nasty stuck in there and then rose upright to scratch his head.
“Well, first of all:“ he slapped Dean on the head - hard.
“OW! What’cha doin’ that for?”
“That was for drugging me, you stupid ass.” Sam growled. “and that -“ he smacked Dean again “-was for sneaking away and trying to kill yourself without me” he hissed.
Dean rubbed his head and glared at his brother. “Well, sorry for the drugs, but I kinda had the idea that you’d appreciate not watching me kill myself. So I’m rather not sorry for that sneaking part. Also, what the fuck! Why’m I still… why’m I not… what did I do last night?” Oh, he so didn’t like the expression on Sam’s face. It was in a way a relief to not see some puppy-eyes trying for comfort, so at least he didn’t injure anyone, maybe not even Sam. Maybe the fucker had tranqued him? “And why the fuck am I naked in bed with ya?”
“Oh, you were having a blast, boy.” Sam chuckled. “First, you ripped up your clothes, so the nakedness is your own fault. Then you went and killed seven evil little fuckers - Dean so didn’t squeak, no Sir, he so didn’t - “before you licked your balls and drooled on my bed.” He grinned some more, but Dean got the impression that whatever else might’ve happened, it wasn’t bad and he probably would never know. “And later you jumped on my bed and fell asleep, and apparently being a naked wolf leads to being a naked Dean in the morning.”
Dean shifted around some, trying to find a piece of clothing he could reach.
“What’cha mean - I killed seven fuckers?” he asked, a little tentatively. When Sam’s grin spread like that of a maniac clown, he knew he wouldn’t like it, not one bit.
“You wondering what that furry feeling in your mouth his?” Before Dean could shake his head, Sam was right there in his personal space. “It is, actually, exactly that.” Watching Sam’s expression, Dean could guess what his own was doing then. Sam’s grin spread even wider, and Dean swallowed. “What says ‘squeak’ and has a long tail, Dean?” he asked innocently, and Dean choked and rushed to the bathroom to throw up everything he’d eaten - swallowed? - last night. It felt more disgusting than anything he’d ever thrown up, including that one incident when he’d been seventeen and made that stupid bet.
After what felt like an eternity of upchucking blood and fur and tiny claws - yes he’d looked, exactly once - Dean knelt in front of the toilet, shivering from the exhaustion of throwing up his guts. A glass of water appeared from somewhere and he rinsed his mouth thoroughly. A hand took the empty glass and gave it back a moment later, filled.
This time, he drank and swallowed, feeling the cool water hit his empty stomach and shivering when the cold spread through him. He felt stupid and vulnerable, kneeling bare-assed over the can in front of his brother.
“Thanks” he croaked anyway.
“Yeah. Don’t mention it” Sam answered. “Sorry” he added after a while.
Dean looked up and took in Sam’s features. He was pale and he looked guilty, so not really that much difference to the last time he’d seen him. Groaning, he stood and winced at the crack and creak and the pain in his knees. He was getting old, no two ways about it. And his dick was cold.
“’s all right. Don’t worry, Sam. So, why’m I…” he looked at himself “still me? Naked me, but me. Or, why’m I alive? Not that I’m not grateful, I am” God, he was, Sam’d never know just how grateful he was “but… uh, why didn’t I get all evil?”
Sam threw a pair of boxers and a shirt at Dean, which he gladly put on. “Truthfully? No idea.”
“That’s reassuring…” Dean muttered and started to brush his teeth. “So te’ me fawt happn’d”
Sam sighed, rubbed his head and sighed again. “Right. But not here. You up for breakfast?” After contemplating his sore stomach, Dean nodded. Breakfast sounded awesome.
Breakfast, was indeed awesome. While Dean was finishing his pancakes, Sam sighed once more and stared into his coffee-cup.
“So… I didn’t shoot you” he muttered, and Dean dropped his napkin. No use in eating more, he needed to hear this, and if he needed to barf again, he better not put anything more into his stomach.
“Go on”
Sam looked up. There was misery in his eyes, but also the steel Dean’d come to recognize over the last years, the resolve and strength his brother had developed. The same silent intelligence and power that’d made him able to survive, made him able to beat the devil.
“Don’t give me crap about it, ok” he started before Dean could even blink “I couldn’t, I tried, but I couldn’t. If there… if there was even a hint of a chance… I’d rather be absolutely certain that you’d kill people than err on the side of being trigger-happy!” Sam was hissing and Dean held up his hands.
“Hey, man, not complaining, ok? S’ not that that I was looking forward to being dead. Again. But… Go on. What else?”
Sam filled him in, and even though Dean was really happy that both of them were alive and unharmed, he was a tiny bit disappointed as to what a wimpy wolf he turned out to be.
“So, I just… followed you? Just like that?”
“Yupp, pretty much. You went into the dumpster and killed the rats, then followed me into the room and behaved like a good little puppy.”
“Bitch. Be glad I didn’t rip out your throat”
“Oh, I am.” Sam smirked “But still, you were a cute little puppy, all obedient and shit”
Dean didn’t like the implications. Too often while growing up had he felt to be nothing but the family-dog to be able to enjoy the teasing. “Shut up, Sam. Let’s focus on why. Why didn’t I rip your throat out? I don’t remember anything from the night after you showed up. Is there…has there ever been a werewolf who didn’t kill?”
Sam sagged into the seat. “I dunno” he admitted. “I asked Bobby, he’s looking into some stuff, and he said we should go to him for…whatever. But yesterday, he didn’t know anything. I didn’t find anything on the net either, so…” he shrugged and let his hands fall from scratching his head to the off-white table. “I dunno. No clue.”
“Huhm”
“Huhm?”
“Well, it’s kinda… I mean, it’s not really surprising, is it? If there were werewolves out there who don’t kill and maim, nobody would know about them, right? I mean, who’d care? We didn’t know about that Lucky-guy until he killed somebody, remember?”
“Huhm.”
“See? S’ what I said”
The soft grin on Sam’s face was nearly worth the grumbling and growling in his stomach, Dean decided. But he still had to go to the toilet before they left. Apparently, wolves didn’t deal well with pancakes and coffee.
***
You live and learn, Sam thought while watching Dean from the corner of his eye. His brother was sitting on the passenger-seat, grumbling and pouting. It shouldn’t be possible for a man his age and experience to behave like a little kid, but Dean was pursing his lips and huffing every two minutes in an exaggerated pout.
“C’mon, man. It’s not my fault, ok?”
“Shut up, Sam, and drive.”
Sam grinned. It was kinda ridiculous and lotsa fun to see Dean like this, even though it would be more than annoying in a few hours. It really wasn’t his fault that Dean couldn’t take coffee anymore, and his caffeine-withdrawal made him cranky and mean. And tired, which, too, made him cranky and mean. It was gonna be a fun-ride, Sam was sure, and he sighed.
“Stop huffing, Sam! I’m the one who puked three times today. I’m the one who didn’t get coffee, so I’m the only one who’s got any right to be huffing here!”
Oh yeah. Fun ride.
They were too far away to get to Bobby’s in one day. Actually, it would take them about three days, even driving at top speed, which they couldn’t do. More like four when they calculated the breaks into it.
So after eight hours of open road, Sam was so tired that not even rock-music on full volume made him stay awake. He was twitchy from the coffee he’d drunk - about a gallon, it felt - and even though Dean had been driving for about half the time, it was just too much. They both hadn’t slept much last night, and they both hadn’t slept much in the weeks before that.
Not to mention the fact that his brother would turn again tonight, and Sam couldn’t imagine that a car was the best place to do that.
He sagged in relief when he spotted the sign for a motel and assembled his last reserves to get the last mile done without driving them into a ditch. In the parking-lot, he sat for a while and just stared, ready to fall asleep right there.
“You plannin’ on camping out here?”
Sam jerked up. Apparently, he’d been out of it more than he’d realized, because his brother stood outside his window with a key dangling from his finger. “Uh… yeah. No.” Sam muttered and put the car back in gear, followed Dean to room twenty-five.
Just behind the door, Sam nearly ran into Dean’s back. “Hey, getta move on, dude. Wanna sleep” Dean turned around and looked at him, uncertain and tired.
“Uhm… what’s… could… what happens when I turn?”
Shit. Sam hadn’t really thought about that, except that he’d thought about nothing else for miles.
“You gonna… uhm, tie me up?” Dean’s voice was softer and hesitant. He hated to be tied up, could usually work through it, but it always took effort. Sam knew that. And, well, it wasn’t that different from his own issues. They never mentioned it, just knew and tried to avoid it.
Sam considered the idea, though. Briefly. It wasn’t unreasonable, but the last time, Dean’d been in so much pain, writhing and shifting around that the chance of accidental strangulation was indeed a possibility. “No. I think it’s… I’ll wake up when you shift. ‘S not that I won’t notice.”
Dean stared at him for a moment, then shrugged. “Yeah, guessing from the crappy feeling I remember, it wasn’t a trip to the beach.” He started to undress, just let his shirt and jeans drop to the floor where he stood, stepping out of his boots and socks.
Sam just shook his head.
Dean dropped on his bed, curled his arms around his soggy, lumpy pillow and started snoring right away. Upon touching his pillow, Sam was asleep, too, knowing he’d wake up from the noise of Dean shifting form and be there to… be there just in case.
********
Chapter 3
Author:marlowe78
Rating: PG 13
Characters: Dean, Sam
Word count: a lot
Spoilers: for s6, the basics
Warnings: Language, some blood is spilled.
Summary: Do not mess with Mowgli's brother. You can be pretty sure his teeth are sharp
Chapter 1
He called Bobby. Of course he did, right after Sam’d watched Dean stalk, jump, kill and devour seven huge, ugly, disgusting rats with disturbing speed and gusto. The morbid, black-humor-part of Sam’s brain said it was due payback for all the times Dean had been scared by rats and more payback even for that one time when a sixteen-year-old Dean had been imprisoned in that cave with about hundreds of the little fuckers. The more rational, more Sam-like part of his brain said it was good that Dean seemed to be happy killing rats instead of humans.
Bobby, being the man that he was, yelled at Sam-you-stupid-idjit for about fifteen minutes for not calling him when it happened, for going through this alone, for not asking for backup and told him some other, less helpful things. Until Sam spoke, not too loud, just loud enough to be heard. “So you’d have let him turn and wait? Or would you’ve put a bullet in him?” Silence from the other end. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Sam scratched his head and sighed. “It doesn’t matter. Because right now? I’ve got a huge wolf on my bed that just killed seven rats with more speed than you’d think possible, and the only really evil thing he’s doing is licking his balls.” Bobby laughed and said that not only leopards can’t change their spots, apparently. Sam smiled a bit. “Did I mention he’s doing it on my bed?”
This time when Bobby laughed, Sam laughed right with him. The huge wolf that was his brother stopped licking and grinned, like only a wolf could do, tongue lolling and eyes sparkling.
Without thought, Sam reached over and scratched the animal behind his ear, marveling in the trust the big furball displayed by just dropping to the side and exposing his belly and throat. The coat was warm but rough, not at all nice to the touch. Only on some places was it softer, like behind the ears. Dean groaned in happiness and demanded more scratching with his paw when Sam stopped for a moment.
“So, how’s it possible? How… how is he still … well, kinda my brother?”
Bobby told him he didn’t have a clue, but he’d get right on it and Sam’d better get his and Dean’s asses over to him so they could figure it out. And while they were there, Dean could take care of the rat-infestation in the yard.
Sam chuckled again and hung up. He continued to scratch the wolf until he finally found that magic spot that all canines seemed to have, the one that made the hind-legs twitch automatically. It was fun, and it felt good, and the wolf was warm and furry and alive, and really, if that was how it would be from now on, Sam could live with it. He’d just have to make sure his new friend wouldn’t tear humans apart.
***
“Stay here, ok? I’ll go get something to eat for ya, but you gotta stay here, ok?” he told the wolf - Dean. The wolf cocked his head and grinned, flattening his ears a tiny second like he’d done outside in the woods. Sam took it as a yes and closed the door behind him, hoping nobody would try to break into their room.
When he came back, the huge ball of fur on the bed looked up without moving his head, telling Sam that he’d known it would be him and nobody else, and also telling him that it’d been quiet, if Sam judged the sleeping-position right.
“You hungry, Grey-Brother?”
The wolf’s head shot up the second he caught wind of the smell from the insulation-bag that Sam had deliberated along with an assortment of meat from the butcher at the other side of the town. He put them on different plates - one for the heart, one for the liver, one for the paunch and so on, until he had ten different plates with ten different meats in front of him.
“Ok, I’ll - “ he stopped when he spotted Dean, sitting on Sam’s bed, drooling like a waterfall. “Dude! That’s disgusting!” The wolf looked chastised and ducked, avoiding Sam’s eyes and laying his ears flat. He looked pitiful, not evil at all. “All right, sorry. C’mon, let’s see what you like best”
Dean jumped from the bed and slinked over, lunging at the plate Sam was just preparing to put on the ground. “Ey, wait!” he said and was astonished how fast the wolf obeyed and stepped back. Watching the animal from the corner of his eye, Sam put the other plates in a row on the ground, smiling to himself when he noticed the puddle of drool around his wolf-brother’s paws.
“Ok. Now, look at me” the wolf did. “Go and pick something. Pick one thing. You can’t have all, ok? Take the best, not the first piece, you get that?” The wolf just licked his lips and kept staring at the food. “Right. Ok. Not expecting much, but…ok, right, go and eat.” When the wolf still didn’t move, Sam indicated at the meat with his hand, and like an arrow, the animal was at the plates, sniffing piece after piece thoroughly.
Honestly, Sam had expected that Dean’d choose the heart. It wasn’t a human heart, but it was a heart, and it was fresh.
And Dean did. For a second, it looked like he’d take the paunch, but the lure of the big, bloody muscle seemed to be too much. A bit disappointed, but not as much as he’d feared, Sam put the rest of the stuff into the tiny fridge for tomorrow.
At four in the morning, after a long-needed shower, Sam crawled into bed - Dean’s, not his drool- and fur-covered one - prepared to fall into exhausted sleep. Right before he went under completely, he felt a weight jump on the mattress next to him, heard some scratching and felt some turning - and some more, and more, and more - until the large body dropped close to his side with a grunt and a happy groan, curling into a ball and sighing like only a dog - or apparently a wolf - can to express extreme contentment.
Sam didn’t have the heart to chase the animal away.
***
It was light out when he woke. His body was sore but not much more than after a heavy workout. It was hot in the bed, and somebody was lying next to him, though Dean didn’t recall picking up a girl last night. But there had to be, because he was absolutely certain from the breeze on his more private parts that he was naked.
Not that he recalled much of yesterday at all. There was something… something had happened. Or hadn’t it? And why would he take a girl into his own motel-room, where Sammy might drop in on… Sam?
“Sam?” he croaked. Damn, his voice was wrecked, like he’d been screaming…
With a jolt, Dean was vertical. The werewolf, Sam, the little forest, his gun, turning, the pain - all came crashing in on him and he grabbed his head and moaned in pain and misery. If he was dead, he did want some more time to pretend that he wasn’t in Hell. And if he wasn’t, then he wanted another moment of ignorance before fully waking to the horrors he’d inflicted, before knowing who he’d killed. Before knowing that Sam was dead again. Because he sure as hell wouldn’t be sitting unrestrained if Sam wasn’t dead, right?
“Dean?”
Shit. What?
“Whassup?”
Carefully, not trusting this, Dean turned around and looked. The person next to him wasn’t a girl, and it wasn’t a dead, ripped-apart thing either. It was Sam, healthy and bleary-eyed, looking at him with his hair sticking up and around in weird angles. Dean scrambled around to grab a sheet and cover up his nakedness.
“You’a’ight?” the Sam-thing asked, and it was a good question, considering they were sharing a bed which hadn’t happened that often since childhood. Dean blinked. And again.
Something… there was something stuck in his mouth. And, now that he thought of it, his mouth tasted like crap. Like… blood.
“Sam…” he croaked again. “What…what did I do? What did… what happened?”
Sam smacked his lips like he, too, had something nasty stuck in there and then rose upright to scratch his head.
“Well, first of all:“ he slapped Dean on the head - hard.
“OW! What’cha doin’ that for?”
“That was for drugging me, you stupid ass.” Sam growled. “and that -“ he smacked Dean again “-was for sneaking away and trying to kill yourself without me” he hissed.
Dean rubbed his head and glared at his brother. “Well, sorry for the drugs, but I kinda had the idea that you’d appreciate not watching me kill myself. So I’m rather not sorry for that sneaking part. Also, what the fuck! Why’m I still… why’m I not… what did I do last night?” Oh, he so didn’t like the expression on Sam’s face. It was in a way a relief to not see some puppy-eyes trying for comfort, so at least he didn’t injure anyone, maybe not even Sam. Maybe the fucker had tranqued him? “And why the fuck am I naked in bed with ya?”
“Oh, you were having a blast, boy.” Sam chuckled. “First, you ripped up your clothes, so the nakedness is your own fault. Then you went and killed seven evil little fuckers - Dean so didn’t squeak, no Sir, he so didn’t - “before you licked your balls and drooled on my bed.” He grinned some more, but Dean got the impression that whatever else might’ve happened, it wasn’t bad and he probably would never know. “And later you jumped on my bed and fell asleep, and apparently being a naked wolf leads to being a naked Dean in the morning.”
Dean shifted around some, trying to find a piece of clothing he could reach.
“What’cha mean - I killed seven fuckers?” he asked, a little tentatively. When Sam’s grin spread like that of a maniac clown, he knew he wouldn’t like it, not one bit.
“You wondering what that furry feeling in your mouth his?” Before Dean could shake his head, Sam was right there in his personal space. “It is, actually, exactly that.” Watching Sam’s expression, Dean could guess what his own was doing then. Sam’s grin spread even wider, and Dean swallowed. “What says ‘squeak’ and has a long tail, Dean?” he asked innocently, and Dean choked and rushed to the bathroom to throw up everything he’d eaten - swallowed? - last night. It felt more disgusting than anything he’d ever thrown up, including that one incident when he’d been seventeen and made that stupid bet.
After what felt like an eternity of upchucking blood and fur and tiny claws - yes he’d looked, exactly once - Dean knelt in front of the toilet, shivering from the exhaustion of throwing up his guts. A glass of water appeared from somewhere and he rinsed his mouth thoroughly. A hand took the empty glass and gave it back a moment later, filled.
This time, he drank and swallowed, feeling the cool water hit his empty stomach and shivering when the cold spread through him. He felt stupid and vulnerable, kneeling bare-assed over the can in front of his brother.
“Thanks” he croaked anyway.
“Yeah. Don’t mention it” Sam answered. “Sorry” he added after a while.
Dean looked up and took in Sam’s features. He was pale and he looked guilty, so not really that much difference to the last time he’d seen him. Groaning, he stood and winced at the crack and creak and the pain in his knees. He was getting old, no two ways about it. And his dick was cold.
“’s all right. Don’t worry, Sam. So, why’m I…” he looked at himself “still me? Naked me, but me. Or, why’m I alive? Not that I’m not grateful, I am” God, he was, Sam’d never know just how grateful he was “but… uh, why didn’t I get all evil?”
Sam threw a pair of boxers and a shirt at Dean, which he gladly put on. “Truthfully? No idea.”
“That’s reassuring…” Dean muttered and started to brush his teeth. “So te’ me fawt happn’d”
Sam sighed, rubbed his head and sighed again. “Right. But not here. You up for breakfast?” After contemplating his sore stomach, Dean nodded. Breakfast sounded awesome.
Breakfast, was indeed awesome. While Dean was finishing his pancakes, Sam sighed once more and stared into his coffee-cup.
“So… I didn’t shoot you” he muttered, and Dean dropped his napkin. No use in eating more, he needed to hear this, and if he needed to barf again, he better not put anything more into his stomach.
“Go on”
Sam looked up. There was misery in his eyes, but also the steel Dean’d come to recognize over the last years, the resolve and strength his brother had developed. The same silent intelligence and power that’d made him able to survive, made him able to beat the devil.
“Don’t give me crap about it, ok” he started before Dean could even blink “I couldn’t, I tried, but I couldn’t. If there… if there was even a hint of a chance… I’d rather be absolutely certain that you’d kill people than err on the side of being trigger-happy!” Sam was hissing and Dean held up his hands.
“Hey, man, not complaining, ok? S’ not that that I was looking forward to being dead. Again. But… Go on. What else?”
Sam filled him in, and even though Dean was really happy that both of them were alive and unharmed, he was a tiny bit disappointed as to what a wimpy wolf he turned out to be.
“So, I just… followed you? Just like that?”
“Yupp, pretty much. You went into the dumpster and killed the rats, then followed me into the room and behaved like a good little puppy.”
“Bitch. Be glad I didn’t rip out your throat”
“Oh, I am.” Sam smirked “But still, you were a cute little puppy, all obedient and shit”
Dean didn’t like the implications. Too often while growing up had he felt to be nothing but the family-dog to be able to enjoy the teasing. “Shut up, Sam. Let’s focus on why. Why didn’t I rip your throat out? I don’t remember anything from the night after you showed up. Is there…has there ever been a werewolf who didn’t kill?”
Sam sagged into the seat. “I dunno” he admitted. “I asked Bobby, he’s looking into some stuff, and he said we should go to him for…whatever. But yesterday, he didn’t know anything. I didn’t find anything on the net either, so…” he shrugged and let his hands fall from scratching his head to the off-white table. “I dunno. No clue.”
“Huhm”
“Huhm?”
“Well, it’s kinda… I mean, it’s not really surprising, is it? If there were werewolves out there who don’t kill and maim, nobody would know about them, right? I mean, who’d care? We didn’t know about that Lucky-guy until he killed somebody, remember?”
“Huhm.”
“See? S’ what I said”
The soft grin on Sam’s face was nearly worth the grumbling and growling in his stomach, Dean decided. But he still had to go to the toilet before they left. Apparently, wolves didn’t deal well with pancakes and coffee.
***
You live and learn, Sam thought while watching Dean from the corner of his eye. His brother was sitting on the passenger-seat, grumbling and pouting. It shouldn’t be possible for a man his age and experience to behave like a little kid, but Dean was pursing his lips and huffing every two minutes in an exaggerated pout.
“C’mon, man. It’s not my fault, ok?”
“Shut up, Sam, and drive.”
Sam grinned. It was kinda ridiculous and lotsa fun to see Dean like this, even though it would be more than annoying in a few hours. It really wasn’t his fault that Dean couldn’t take coffee anymore, and his caffeine-withdrawal made him cranky and mean. And tired, which, too, made him cranky and mean. It was gonna be a fun-ride, Sam was sure, and he sighed.
“Stop huffing, Sam! I’m the one who puked three times today. I’m the one who didn’t get coffee, so I’m the only one who’s got any right to be huffing here!”
Oh yeah. Fun ride.
They were too far away to get to Bobby’s in one day. Actually, it would take them about three days, even driving at top speed, which they couldn’t do. More like four when they calculated the breaks into it.
So after eight hours of open road, Sam was so tired that not even rock-music on full volume made him stay awake. He was twitchy from the coffee he’d drunk - about a gallon, it felt - and even though Dean had been driving for about half the time, it was just too much. They both hadn’t slept much last night, and they both hadn’t slept much in the weeks before that.
Not to mention the fact that his brother would turn again tonight, and Sam couldn’t imagine that a car was the best place to do that.
He sagged in relief when he spotted the sign for a motel and assembled his last reserves to get the last mile done without driving them into a ditch. In the parking-lot, he sat for a while and just stared, ready to fall asleep right there.
“You plannin’ on camping out here?”
Sam jerked up. Apparently, he’d been out of it more than he’d realized, because his brother stood outside his window with a key dangling from his finger. “Uh… yeah. No.” Sam muttered and put the car back in gear, followed Dean to room twenty-five.
Just behind the door, Sam nearly ran into Dean’s back. “Hey, getta move on, dude. Wanna sleep” Dean turned around and looked at him, uncertain and tired.
“Uhm… what’s… could… what happens when I turn?”
Shit. Sam hadn’t really thought about that, except that he’d thought about nothing else for miles.
“You gonna… uhm, tie me up?” Dean’s voice was softer and hesitant. He hated to be tied up, could usually work through it, but it always took effort. Sam knew that. And, well, it wasn’t that different from his own issues. They never mentioned it, just knew and tried to avoid it.
Sam considered the idea, though. Briefly. It wasn’t unreasonable, but the last time, Dean’d been in so much pain, writhing and shifting around that the chance of accidental strangulation was indeed a possibility. “No. I think it’s… I’ll wake up when you shift. ‘S not that I won’t notice.”
Dean stared at him for a moment, then shrugged. “Yeah, guessing from the crappy feeling I remember, it wasn’t a trip to the beach.” He started to undress, just let his shirt and jeans drop to the floor where he stood, stepping out of his boots and socks.
Sam just shook his head.
Dean dropped on his bed, curled his arms around his soggy, lumpy pillow and started snoring right away. Upon touching his pillow, Sam was asleep, too, knowing he’d wake up from the noise of Dean shifting form and be there to… be there just in case.
********
Chapter 3