Time Bump 6/?
Title: Time Bump
Author:mlebayre
Genre: General
Characters/Pairings: No Pairings, Dean and Sam, some other folks.
Rating: R
Spoilers : In my happy fanfic world Sam never died, so Dean never made his deal and yadda yadda yadda never happened. The boys are their current ages in this fic and I’m not above using cannon or events from any of the four seasons aired to date, excluding the parts that have to do with the yadda yadda yadda.
Summary: Where time comes crashing down.
People are dying near the long ago abandoned Trumpeter Mine. The brothers find more than ghosts. An old, haunted mine and a pack of human thieves, what's not to love?
Series: none
Disclaimer: Not mine, just borrowing from Kripke.
A/N: This fic is dedicated to the wonderful, and incredibly patient bhoney who kindly bid on me in the Support Stacie author auction. Many thanks to my betas, 6Cookie6 and Vanessa and to Sojourner84 for the amazing banner!
Sam stopped a few feet from the semi-completed pile of bones, leaned against the wall and slid down rocking back on his heels. Dean gave him a look that was half concern and half question, but said nothing. “We have to finish this.”
“Yeah.” Dean started piling the scattered bones on top of the file they’d started not so long ago. “Problem is we won’t be able to light this or any fire in here.”
“We’re gonna freeze.” Sam tried pulling his jacket closer and wrapped his arms around himself.
“No…we’re not.” Reaching down, Dean tapped against Sam’s shoulder, “Gimme a hand. You’ll stay warmer moving around.”
Nodding, Sam pushed to his feet. His blood felt like sludge, his muscles sore, stiff and slow to respond to the commands his brain sent. Simply following Dean’s actions, he collected a pile of bones and set them with the others.
“Hey,” This time Dean was poking his arm. “Did you hear me?”
Sam’s mind scrambled to catch up, it seemed to be as sluggish as the rest of him. “Huh?”
“You with me?”
“Yeah, sorry. What did you ask me?”
“Do you feel anything? From them?” Dean waved one hand over the pile.
Straightening and turning so he faced Dean fully, Sam had to think about his question. Gulping down a thick swallow and nodding, Sam realized his body wasn’t reacting to the cold as much as to what his head was picking up from the spirits of the miners. Great, now he was some sort of cosmic receiver.
“Well?” The annoyance creeping into Dean’s voice told Sam all he needed to know about how trapped his brother was feeling.
“It’s hard to breathe.” Sam rubbed his chest then the back of his neck. “I feel like I’ve run two marathons and didn’t cool down. All stiff and sore, like-”
“Like rigomortis ?”
Forcing down another swallow, Sam nodded wincing at how the muscles along the back of his neck pulled and his skin itched and stretched.
“We have to take stock of what weapons we have.”
“Everything we have is going to make this place explode,” Sam pointed out. He tried a few deep breaths to fill his lungs, but his ribs pulled and caught in his chest making pains shoot from sternum to spine. “Maybe we can wait them out? They don’t have a way to light the mine and are using this for storage. If they leave, we can light the bones. That will make the gases in here ignite and probably close off most the entrance too.” He hunched over far enough to rest one hand against a knee.
Stepping closer, Dean rubbed his back a few times. “Can you breathe okay?”
“Yeah, it hurts though and I feel like I really can’t catch my breath, but I’m not dizzy or anything. I don’t think it’s real, more like phantom sensations.”
“So, it’s really all in your head?”
Looking up, Sam lifted one corner of his lip and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but what if what’s in my head comes out, like the rocks?”
“I think if that was going to happen it would have by now. They, the men who died here, they’re obviously trying to communicate.” Dean tipped his head to one side and sighed. “Doing a piss poor job of it if you ask me, but they led us here and showed us where they were buried.”
Sam shivered and sat down when waves of nausea rolled through him and the sharp tang of bile bit at the back of his throat. “They didn’t want to die, Dean. They were afraid and they suffered, a lot.”
“Then a hundred years later some guys come along and use their resting place to store car parts and other people start doing things to the mine, restoring it and stir them up even more.”
Sam’s gaze skimmed the dim tunnel. “Do you suppose those rails are made of iron?”
“Probably…” Dean’s voice trailed off, he quirked an eyebrow and met Sam’s gaze steadily. Sidestepping fast he grabbed one of the duffels they’d brought and extracted two hand picks. “Think these will work?”
“One way to find out.” Sam stood slowly and ignored how Dean watched his legs shake for a few seconds. “We’ve got one thing we can use those guys will never see coming.”
Dean grinned. “Not to mention freak them the hell right out.” Flipping one of the picks around, Dean held the handle out to Sam who grinned, nodded and took the offered tool.
As quietly as they could Dean began prying the iron rails up and handed them off to Sam. He was grateful Dean took the brunt of the most physical part of their project while he worked on laying two continuous lines from the bones out toward the mine entrance careful to keep them end to end and no wider than the pile of bones. As Sam moved farther away from the bones he stepped over the rails so he stood outside his impromptu pathway. At once he felt his muscles loosen and his breathing come easier.
The going was painstakingly slow and after a few hours they were only a third of the way to their goal. Prying another section of rail away from the earth, Dean straightened and held it out.
“Dean,” Sam whispered, jerking his chin toward the mine entrance.
Twisting to face Sam, “What-” Dean pressed his lips into a firm line when Sam raised one hand and touched a forefinger to his lips. Nodding tightly he reached behind him and took his pistol from its spot tucked into his waistband. “I hear them.” Dean’s voice was so low if Sam hadn’t been merely a few feet from him, he’d have never heard.
Separating, each pressed to the wall of the tunnel, inching back soundlessly. Voices of men obviously searching for Dean and Sam drew closer. Dean leaned away from the wall and motioned to Sam to move farther back. Glaring, Sam crossed his arms over his chest, tilted his head to one side and added a slight shake to make his thoughts clear. As if Sam would leave his brother to face a pack of angry thieves.
Shoulders slumping down slightly, Dean bit his bottom lip, face hardening. Sam couldn’t help the small smile; it drove Dean nuts when he did stuff like this and every time seemed so utterly surprised by Sam’s actions. Mouth moving in a silent grumble, Dean stepped carefully over the rails moving as quietly as any spirit until he was beside Sam poking his shoulder and scowling.
“No way am I going back there to hide while you take them on.” Sam hissed in his brother’s ear.
“I wasn’t-” Dean growled.
Sam cut him off immediately, “Can it, yes you were.”
Dean huffed but offered no other comment. He did however, put one hand on Sam’s arm and push him farther back along the tunnel, nodding to a side tunnel, “Let’s try in there.”
Sliding along the tunnel wall Sam made his way to the side tunnel, glancing back every few steps to be sure Dean was right behind him. They ducked into the section of tunnel that was even darker than the one they’d just left and crouched low to the ground.
The voices stopped mere yards from where they were hiding. “You see anything?” one man asked. Sam heard the rustle of clothing and an accompanying grunt. In the next instant he heard their footfalls withdraw and fade away heading outside.
Letting out a breath and dropping his head back against the tunnel wall, Sam eased up, slowly straightening his legs. He reached down and rubbed his thighs and knees a few times grumbling, “Getting stiffer again.”
“We gotta get you out of here, even if I have to kill everyone of them.”
Sam sighed, “Dean, I had that nightmare about the collapse in our motel.”
“Yeah…well…” Dean gave him a look that mirrored Sam’s own frustration.
Small pebbles and bits of dirt trickled down the tunnel wall making them start and turn to look at it. Dean’s fingers winding around Sam’s arm jerked his attention to his brother. Dean was backing up slowly, taking Sam with him and this time Sam wasn’t arguing. He had no desire to be left alone in the pitch black of the mine with his body reenacting how men died a hundred years prior to Sam even being born. Even if he wasn’t channeling these men Sam would have very willingly followed Dean’s lead. He didn’t like it in here.
As they rounded the corner to the main tunnel to continue their task of moving the rails Dean’s sudden shove against Sam’s chest surprised him and sent him bouncing into the stone wall. A whoosh of air left his lungs too fast and sparks danced around the periphery of his vision which picked that moment to decide now was a good time to start graying in and out.
Dean’s snarl of, “Sonofa-” was cut off by a pained yelp and the distinct sound of skin hitting skin. What sort of life did Sam have that he could identify that sound as Dean’s fist hitting someone else’s face?
Lurching forward into the fray, Sam got a glimpse of two men throwing fists at his brother, two of the bastards and they still couldn’t take down Sam’s big brother. A swell of pride and adrenaline got his sluggish limbs moving, but not with nearly the force he normally had. Putting his weight behind his hit to make up for the fact that no part of his body wanted to work properly, Sam brought one fist up from near his hip and slammed it into one man’s torso, hitting the soft part just under the ribs and drove up.
More lights twinkled on and off. Sam realized they weren’t for his eyes only, since their appearance drew the attention of Dean and the two men attacking them. The distraction gave Dean the time he needed to completely take one man out, knocking him cold. The man Sam attacked staggered, but didn’t fall. Recovering a bit too quickly he was coming at Sam far faster than Sam’s muddied brain and sluggish legs could get him moving to defend himself.
Raising the pick he still held in one hand, Sam intended to drive it into whatever part of the guy he could. Strong fingers wrapped around his wrist, a knee bashed into his inner thigh at the same time, then with a sharp yank Sam’s arm was wrenched sideways and twisted, the pick torn from his grasp. The man shoved him into the tunnel wall hard enough that for a second time the breath was knocked from his chest.
The scuffle of boots against the damp ground, the sounds of Dean and the man grappling steeled Sam’s resolve. He shoved away from the wall and stumbled more than ran at the two men. His vision cleared completely in time for him to see the pick come down, aimed right for Dean’s skull.
Sam’s cry of, “NO!” made the man jerk sideways, again giving Dean the upper hand. He dodged the impending blow while at the same time smashed his fist repeatedly into the man’s face, taking him down. The pick missed splitting Dean’s skull, but it didn’t miss his arm, slicing through from shoulder to elbow, shredding muscle and skin.
Releasing the man, Dean clutched his arm, shouting through clenched teeth, he dropped to his knees. Sam skirted the fallen man, slid down beside his brother and had his hand pressed to Dean’s bleeding arm in seconds. The wound wasn’t deep, but it was long and had to be painful. Dean wouldn’t lose his arm or bleed to death, but it could still get infected. Sam’s mind raced through what he had to do, get to their duffels, get the wound cleaned, the bleeding stopped. His world narrowed down to his brother, it seemed the only thing he could focus on at that moment.
“Sam, move it…c’mon, S’mmy.” Despite his slight slurring Dean had a death grip on Sam’s arms and was shoving him back, trying to get in front of Sam and move him away all at once which resulted in them both landing hard on their butts.
Sam looked up from Dean’s bloodied jacket. “We’ve got-” He literally felt the blood drain from his face when he finally looked beyond his brother.
The entire tunnel was filled with small lights winking on and off. The air between the rails shuddered and the entire scene shifted between what it was now and what Sam imagined it looked like when the mine was in operation. Sam pressed one hand against Dean’s wounded arm, the other rested against his back, as he fisted that hand as tightly as possible in Dean’s jacket and tugged his brother back.
One of the men lay completely inside the rails, the other lay across the narrow passage, with his head against one rail and his legs sprawled over the opposite one. Images of men, miners, flickered around the unconscious men, coming into focus and sliding away the next second only to reappear closer a heartbeat later.
“Christ, Sam, move.” Dean twisted around so his free hand grabbed at Sam’s elbow and kicked with his feet, inching the two of them away from the men and ghosts.
Dirt and small rocks took flight inside the rails, spinning around the men. They came to as clothes and skin started shredding off them, their screams muffled by the wind created in the swirl of dust and debris. Blood and skin combined with the dirt, creating a rusty cloud that billowed out as far as the barrier of the rails allowed then sucked in on itself.
Winding one arm around Dean’s waist, Sam hauled the two of them to their feet, staring over Dean’s shoulder at the hideous sight of mangled flesh and bones being stripped bare. His stomach lurched, cold speared through his chest straight down to his gut. Arms and legs felt as if they’d been frozen and would crack with any move he made.
Seconds later everything went deathly quiet. The small lights fluttered out of existence, the dirt settled inside the rails and the only thing that remained of their attackers were two sets of perfectly cleaned off skeletons.
Sam felt how his brother shook as Dean backed away even farther, pressing Sam securely between himself and the tunnel wall. “Time to go,” Sam said, pulling Dean farther down the tunnel. Despite the urgency that rocketed through him, Sam’s limbs were uncooperative once again forcing him to let Dean take more of his weight than he could himself. Stumbling and bouncing off the wall a few times they didn’t stop until they reached the spot where they’d been piling the bones of a dozen or more men. Glancing back at the way they’d come, Sam dropped his gaze to the ground.
Easing away from Sam’s grip, Dean leaned against one wall and slide to the ground. He looked down the tunnel and seemed to read Sam’s mind. “We’ll go back and collect them in a bit. I have to rest first.”
Moving away from Dean only long enough to retrieve their duffels, Sam dug out gauze, antiseptic, cotton, pain pills and water. Scooting back, he settled beside Dean and started pulling the jacket away. Dean’s hand brushed his, forcing Sam away. “It’s okay. We don’t have the time to waste on this.”
“Shut up, Dean. Just let me, please…I need…” He couldn’t finish the sentence, but a quick glance up at Dean’s face and how the understanding filtered into his eyes told him Dean understood plenty. Feigning annoyance, Dean pressed his lips into a tight line, leaned his head back against the wall and let his eyelids drop shut. In spite of his fear Sam smiled at his brother’s never ending antics and the front he seemed to want to put up, the front Sam was always able to see past.
With shaking hands Sam eased away Dean’s clothes, cleaned the jagged wound and put in a few stitches, wrapping his arm when he finished.
“Gonna have a good scar from that one,” Dean said without opening his eyes.
“Yeah.” Sam croaked out. “I think we’ll be okay here for a bit.”
Dean rolled his head to face Sam, opening his eyes, “Are you guessing, or is it something else?”
“Something else.”
Sighing, Dean shifted around, and pulled the blankets they’d left laying on the ground around him. Dipping his head to his good side he sighed. “Let’s get some rest, sort out what to do when we can think more clearly.”
Sam moved around and sat beside his brother, back leaning against the tunnel wall, shoulder pressing into Dean’s. “Take.” He held out the pills and water.
Dean took the water, but not the pills mumbling, “pain will keep me awake.”
“The pain will make you slow,” Sam snapped.
Huffing, Dean tossed the blanket around Sam too. “Fine.” He downed the pills and half the water bottle, handing it back to Sam. “Drink.”
Grinning, Sam did as his brother asked tossing the empty bottle at the duffel when he was done. “Keep up your bitching and I’ll buy the pink Band-Aids with sunflowers on them next time.”
Dean huffed some annoyed sound.
Warmth from Dean’s body seeped into Sam, making his muscles loosen and his eyelids get heavy. For the first time in a few days he wasn’t freezing from the inside out and he wasn’t afraid of what he’d see in his sleep.
When he pried his eyes open he immediately brought one hand out from under the blanket to rub the crust and goo out to make prying his eyelashes apart easier. He was cocooned in the blanket, Dean’s jacket under his head for a pillow. Pushing up on one arm Sam looked around, turning to the sound of footsteps and something he knew all too well were human bones being dropped.
Dean was letting go of one end of the other blanket as a jumble of bones tumbled free, landing in their own pile beside the one of the miners’ bones they’d started earlier.
“Why’d you go by yourself?” Sam sat up, angry and not even trying to hide that fact.
Rolling his eyes and giving Sam a long suffering look, Dean sighed. “Sam, it’s twenty feet away. If I’d yelled and needed you, you’d have been there in a second.”
There wasn’t much Sam could say to refute that statement, so he resorted to glaring.
Dean sat facing Sam. “Game’s been changed. I couldn’t go past the end of the rails, when I tried dirt started flying up in front of me. I saw a few of them for a second.”
Sam scrunched his eyebrows together. “What? Why? That’s-”
“They,” Dean waved at the larger pile of bones, “I think they want to get revenge on those men who disturbed them.”
“And they think we’re going to do that for them?!” The horror of what Dean just said sunk in, firing up Sam’s insides. “We’re not murderers.”
Dean shook his head. “No, I think we’re the bait.”
Chapter 7
Author:mlebayre
Genre: General
Characters/Pairings: No Pairings, Dean and Sam, some other folks.
Rating: R
Spoilers : In my happy fanfic world Sam never died, so Dean never made his deal and yadda yadda yadda never happened. The boys are their current ages in this fic and I’m not above using cannon or events from any of the four seasons aired to date, excluding the parts that have to do with the yadda yadda yadda.
Summary: Where time comes crashing down.
People are dying near the long ago abandoned Trumpeter Mine. The brothers find more than ghosts. An old, haunted mine and a pack of human thieves, what's not to love?
Series: none
Disclaimer: Not mine, just borrowing from Kripke.
A/N: This fic is dedicated to the wonderful, and incredibly patient bhoney who kindly bid on me in the Support Stacie author auction. Many thanks to my betas, 6Cookie6 and Vanessa and to Sojourner84 for the amazing banner!
Sam stopped a few feet from the semi-completed pile of bones, leaned against the wall and slid down rocking back on his heels. Dean gave him a look that was half concern and half question, but said nothing. “We have to finish this.”
“Yeah.” Dean started piling the scattered bones on top of the file they’d started not so long ago. “Problem is we won’t be able to light this or any fire in here.”
“We’re gonna freeze.” Sam tried pulling his jacket closer and wrapped his arms around himself.
“No…we’re not.” Reaching down, Dean tapped against Sam’s shoulder, “Gimme a hand. You’ll stay warmer moving around.”
Nodding, Sam pushed to his feet. His blood felt like sludge, his muscles sore, stiff and slow to respond to the commands his brain sent. Simply following Dean’s actions, he collected a pile of bones and set them with the others.
“Hey,” This time Dean was poking his arm. “Did you hear me?”
Sam’s mind scrambled to catch up, it seemed to be as sluggish as the rest of him. “Huh?”
“You with me?”
“Yeah, sorry. What did you ask me?”
“Do you feel anything? From them?” Dean waved one hand over the pile.
Straightening and turning so he faced Dean fully, Sam had to think about his question. Gulping down a thick swallow and nodding, Sam realized his body wasn’t reacting to the cold as much as to what his head was picking up from the spirits of the miners. Great, now he was some sort of cosmic receiver.
“Well?” The annoyance creeping into Dean’s voice told Sam all he needed to know about how trapped his brother was feeling.
“It’s hard to breathe.” Sam rubbed his chest then the back of his neck. “I feel like I’ve run two marathons and didn’t cool down. All stiff and sore, like-”
“Like rigomortis ?”
Forcing down another swallow, Sam nodded wincing at how the muscles along the back of his neck pulled and his skin itched and stretched.
“We have to take stock of what weapons we have.”
“Everything we have is going to make this place explode,” Sam pointed out. He tried a few deep breaths to fill his lungs, but his ribs pulled and caught in his chest making pains shoot from sternum to spine. “Maybe we can wait them out? They don’t have a way to light the mine and are using this for storage. If they leave, we can light the bones. That will make the gases in here ignite and probably close off most the entrance too.” He hunched over far enough to rest one hand against a knee.
Stepping closer, Dean rubbed his back a few times. “Can you breathe okay?”
“Yeah, it hurts though and I feel like I really can’t catch my breath, but I’m not dizzy or anything. I don’t think it’s real, more like phantom sensations.”
“So, it’s really all in your head?”
Looking up, Sam lifted one corner of his lip and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but what if what’s in my head comes out, like the rocks?”
“I think if that was going to happen it would have by now. They, the men who died here, they’re obviously trying to communicate.” Dean tipped his head to one side and sighed. “Doing a piss poor job of it if you ask me, but they led us here and showed us where they were buried.”
Sam shivered and sat down when waves of nausea rolled through him and the sharp tang of bile bit at the back of his throat. “They didn’t want to die, Dean. They were afraid and they suffered, a lot.”
“Then a hundred years later some guys come along and use their resting place to store car parts and other people start doing things to the mine, restoring it and stir them up even more.”
Sam’s gaze skimmed the dim tunnel. “Do you suppose those rails are made of iron?”
“Probably…” Dean’s voice trailed off, he quirked an eyebrow and met Sam’s gaze steadily. Sidestepping fast he grabbed one of the duffels they’d brought and extracted two hand picks. “Think these will work?”
“One way to find out.” Sam stood slowly and ignored how Dean watched his legs shake for a few seconds. “We’ve got one thing we can use those guys will never see coming.”
Dean grinned. “Not to mention freak them the hell right out.” Flipping one of the picks around, Dean held the handle out to Sam who grinned, nodded and took the offered tool.
As quietly as they could Dean began prying the iron rails up and handed them off to Sam. He was grateful Dean took the brunt of the most physical part of their project while he worked on laying two continuous lines from the bones out toward the mine entrance careful to keep them end to end and no wider than the pile of bones. As Sam moved farther away from the bones he stepped over the rails so he stood outside his impromptu pathway. At once he felt his muscles loosen and his breathing come easier.
The going was painstakingly slow and after a few hours they were only a third of the way to their goal. Prying another section of rail away from the earth, Dean straightened and held it out.
“Dean,” Sam whispered, jerking his chin toward the mine entrance.
Twisting to face Sam, “What-” Dean pressed his lips into a firm line when Sam raised one hand and touched a forefinger to his lips. Nodding tightly he reached behind him and took his pistol from its spot tucked into his waistband. “I hear them.” Dean’s voice was so low if Sam hadn’t been merely a few feet from him, he’d have never heard.
Separating, each pressed to the wall of the tunnel, inching back soundlessly. Voices of men obviously searching for Dean and Sam drew closer. Dean leaned away from the wall and motioned to Sam to move farther back. Glaring, Sam crossed his arms over his chest, tilted his head to one side and added a slight shake to make his thoughts clear. As if Sam would leave his brother to face a pack of angry thieves.
Shoulders slumping down slightly, Dean bit his bottom lip, face hardening. Sam couldn’t help the small smile; it drove Dean nuts when he did stuff like this and every time seemed so utterly surprised by Sam’s actions. Mouth moving in a silent grumble, Dean stepped carefully over the rails moving as quietly as any spirit until he was beside Sam poking his shoulder and scowling.
“No way am I going back there to hide while you take them on.” Sam hissed in his brother’s ear.
“I wasn’t-” Dean growled.
Sam cut him off immediately, “Can it, yes you were.”
Dean huffed but offered no other comment. He did however, put one hand on Sam’s arm and push him farther back along the tunnel, nodding to a side tunnel, “Let’s try in there.”
Sliding along the tunnel wall Sam made his way to the side tunnel, glancing back every few steps to be sure Dean was right behind him. They ducked into the section of tunnel that was even darker than the one they’d just left and crouched low to the ground.
The voices stopped mere yards from where they were hiding. “You see anything?” one man asked. Sam heard the rustle of clothing and an accompanying grunt. In the next instant he heard their footfalls withdraw and fade away heading outside.
Letting out a breath and dropping his head back against the tunnel wall, Sam eased up, slowly straightening his legs. He reached down and rubbed his thighs and knees a few times grumbling, “Getting stiffer again.”
“We gotta get you out of here, even if I have to kill everyone of them.”
Sam sighed, “Dean, I had that nightmare about the collapse in our motel.”
“Yeah…well…” Dean gave him a look that mirrored Sam’s own frustration.
Small pebbles and bits of dirt trickled down the tunnel wall making them start and turn to look at it. Dean’s fingers winding around Sam’s arm jerked his attention to his brother. Dean was backing up slowly, taking Sam with him and this time Sam wasn’t arguing. He had no desire to be left alone in the pitch black of the mine with his body reenacting how men died a hundred years prior to Sam even being born. Even if he wasn’t channeling these men Sam would have very willingly followed Dean’s lead. He didn’t like it in here.
As they rounded the corner to the main tunnel to continue their task of moving the rails Dean’s sudden shove against Sam’s chest surprised him and sent him bouncing into the stone wall. A whoosh of air left his lungs too fast and sparks danced around the periphery of his vision which picked that moment to decide now was a good time to start graying in and out.
Dean’s snarl of, “Sonofa-” was cut off by a pained yelp and the distinct sound of skin hitting skin. What sort of life did Sam have that he could identify that sound as Dean’s fist hitting someone else’s face?
Lurching forward into the fray, Sam got a glimpse of two men throwing fists at his brother, two of the bastards and they still couldn’t take down Sam’s big brother. A swell of pride and adrenaline got his sluggish limbs moving, but not with nearly the force he normally had. Putting his weight behind his hit to make up for the fact that no part of his body wanted to work properly, Sam brought one fist up from near his hip and slammed it into one man’s torso, hitting the soft part just under the ribs and drove up.
More lights twinkled on and off. Sam realized they weren’t for his eyes only, since their appearance drew the attention of Dean and the two men attacking them. The distraction gave Dean the time he needed to completely take one man out, knocking him cold. The man Sam attacked staggered, but didn’t fall. Recovering a bit too quickly he was coming at Sam far faster than Sam’s muddied brain and sluggish legs could get him moving to defend himself.
Raising the pick he still held in one hand, Sam intended to drive it into whatever part of the guy he could. Strong fingers wrapped around his wrist, a knee bashed into his inner thigh at the same time, then with a sharp yank Sam’s arm was wrenched sideways and twisted, the pick torn from his grasp. The man shoved him into the tunnel wall hard enough that for a second time the breath was knocked from his chest.
The scuffle of boots against the damp ground, the sounds of Dean and the man grappling steeled Sam’s resolve. He shoved away from the wall and stumbled more than ran at the two men. His vision cleared completely in time for him to see the pick come down, aimed right for Dean’s skull.
Sam’s cry of, “NO!” made the man jerk sideways, again giving Dean the upper hand. He dodged the impending blow while at the same time smashed his fist repeatedly into the man’s face, taking him down. The pick missed splitting Dean’s skull, but it didn’t miss his arm, slicing through from shoulder to elbow, shredding muscle and skin.
Releasing the man, Dean clutched his arm, shouting through clenched teeth, he dropped to his knees. Sam skirted the fallen man, slid down beside his brother and had his hand pressed to Dean’s bleeding arm in seconds. The wound wasn’t deep, but it was long and had to be painful. Dean wouldn’t lose his arm or bleed to death, but it could still get infected. Sam’s mind raced through what he had to do, get to their duffels, get the wound cleaned, the bleeding stopped. His world narrowed down to his brother, it seemed the only thing he could focus on at that moment.
“Sam, move it…c’mon, S’mmy.” Despite his slight slurring Dean had a death grip on Sam’s arms and was shoving him back, trying to get in front of Sam and move him away all at once which resulted in them both landing hard on their butts.
Sam looked up from Dean’s bloodied jacket. “We’ve got-” He literally felt the blood drain from his face when he finally looked beyond his brother.
The entire tunnel was filled with small lights winking on and off. The air between the rails shuddered and the entire scene shifted between what it was now and what Sam imagined it looked like when the mine was in operation. Sam pressed one hand against Dean’s wounded arm, the other rested against his back, as he fisted that hand as tightly as possible in Dean’s jacket and tugged his brother back.
One of the men lay completely inside the rails, the other lay across the narrow passage, with his head against one rail and his legs sprawled over the opposite one. Images of men, miners, flickered around the unconscious men, coming into focus and sliding away the next second only to reappear closer a heartbeat later.
“Christ, Sam, move.” Dean twisted around so his free hand grabbed at Sam’s elbow and kicked with his feet, inching the two of them away from the men and ghosts.
Dirt and small rocks took flight inside the rails, spinning around the men. They came to as clothes and skin started shredding off them, their screams muffled by the wind created in the swirl of dust and debris. Blood and skin combined with the dirt, creating a rusty cloud that billowed out as far as the barrier of the rails allowed then sucked in on itself.
Winding one arm around Dean’s waist, Sam hauled the two of them to their feet, staring over Dean’s shoulder at the hideous sight of mangled flesh and bones being stripped bare. His stomach lurched, cold speared through his chest straight down to his gut. Arms and legs felt as if they’d been frozen and would crack with any move he made.
Seconds later everything went deathly quiet. The small lights fluttered out of existence, the dirt settled inside the rails and the only thing that remained of their attackers were two sets of perfectly cleaned off skeletons.
Sam felt how his brother shook as Dean backed away even farther, pressing Sam securely between himself and the tunnel wall. “Time to go,” Sam said, pulling Dean farther down the tunnel. Despite the urgency that rocketed through him, Sam’s limbs were uncooperative once again forcing him to let Dean take more of his weight than he could himself. Stumbling and bouncing off the wall a few times they didn’t stop until they reached the spot where they’d been piling the bones of a dozen or more men. Glancing back at the way they’d come, Sam dropped his gaze to the ground.
Easing away from Sam’s grip, Dean leaned against one wall and slide to the ground. He looked down the tunnel and seemed to read Sam’s mind. “We’ll go back and collect them in a bit. I have to rest first.”
Moving away from Dean only long enough to retrieve their duffels, Sam dug out gauze, antiseptic, cotton, pain pills and water. Scooting back, he settled beside Dean and started pulling the jacket away. Dean’s hand brushed his, forcing Sam away. “It’s okay. We don’t have the time to waste on this.”
“Shut up, Dean. Just let me, please…I need…” He couldn’t finish the sentence, but a quick glance up at Dean’s face and how the understanding filtered into his eyes told him Dean understood plenty. Feigning annoyance, Dean pressed his lips into a tight line, leaned his head back against the wall and let his eyelids drop shut. In spite of his fear Sam smiled at his brother’s never ending antics and the front he seemed to want to put up, the front Sam was always able to see past.
With shaking hands Sam eased away Dean’s clothes, cleaned the jagged wound and put in a few stitches, wrapping his arm when he finished.
“Gonna have a good scar from that one,” Dean said without opening his eyes.
“Yeah.” Sam croaked out. “I think we’ll be okay here for a bit.”
Dean rolled his head to face Sam, opening his eyes, “Are you guessing, or is it something else?”
“Something else.”
Sighing, Dean shifted around, and pulled the blankets they’d left laying on the ground around him. Dipping his head to his good side he sighed. “Let’s get some rest, sort out what to do when we can think more clearly.”
Sam moved around and sat beside his brother, back leaning against the tunnel wall, shoulder pressing into Dean’s. “Take.” He held out the pills and water.
Dean took the water, but not the pills mumbling, “pain will keep me awake.”
“The pain will make you slow,” Sam snapped.
Huffing, Dean tossed the blanket around Sam too. “Fine.” He downed the pills and half the water bottle, handing it back to Sam. “Drink.”
Grinning, Sam did as his brother asked tossing the empty bottle at the duffel when he was done. “Keep up your bitching and I’ll buy the pink Band-Aids with sunflowers on them next time.”
Dean huffed some annoyed sound.
Warmth from Dean’s body seeped into Sam, making his muscles loosen and his eyelids get heavy. For the first time in a few days he wasn’t freezing from the inside out and he wasn’t afraid of what he’d see in his sleep.
When he pried his eyes open he immediately brought one hand out from under the blanket to rub the crust and goo out to make prying his eyelashes apart easier. He was cocooned in the blanket, Dean’s jacket under his head for a pillow. Pushing up on one arm Sam looked around, turning to the sound of footsteps and something he knew all too well were human bones being dropped.
Dean was letting go of one end of the other blanket as a jumble of bones tumbled free, landing in their own pile beside the one of the miners’ bones they’d started earlier.
“Why’d you go by yourself?” Sam sat up, angry and not even trying to hide that fact.
Rolling his eyes and giving Sam a long suffering look, Dean sighed. “Sam, it’s twenty feet away. If I’d yelled and needed you, you’d have been there in a second.”
There wasn’t much Sam could say to refute that statement, so he resorted to glaring.
Dean sat facing Sam. “Game’s been changed. I couldn’t go past the end of the rails, when I tried dirt started flying up in front of me. I saw a few of them for a second.”
Sam scrunched his eyebrows together. “What? Why? That’s-”
“They,” Dean waved at the larger pile of bones, “I think they want to get revenge on those men who disturbed them.”
“And they think we’re going to do that for them?!” The horror of what Dean just said sunk in, firing up Sam’s insides. “We’re not murderers.”
Dean shook his head. “No, I think we’re the bait.”
Chapter 7