The Woods are Lovely, Dark and Deep (6/14)
Title: The Woods are Lovely, Dark and Deep
Author: Wysawyg
Summary: Sam Winchester was beginning to wonder whether the demon had forgotten his plans for him. Sam Winchester had forgotten that the demon played a long game. Dark!fic. Multi-chapter. Not WIP.
Disclaimer: Everything the light touches belongs to someone else. The darkside too. It’s all Kripke and the guys and gals at the CW.
Warnings and notes: Multiple character death in future chapters. Dark fic.
Rating: PG-13 to R
Pairing/Characters: Mostly gen, some very mild Dean/Jo in future chapters.
Timeline: Diverges AU from season 2. Approximately after Born under a Bad Sign but before Heart.
Beta: Beta’d by the wonderful TraSan who is a wonderful writer and beta but does torture flame-retardant ducks hence proving that no-one is perfect.
Feedback: Makes the hamsters in my head dance, especially concrit.
Previous Chapters: [ 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 ]
The minute that Sam Winchester walked into Ellen’s bar, she knew something was wrong. For one thing, as much as Ellen stared at the door, Dean Winchester didn’t materialise. For another thing, Sam was looking like he’d been a spectator at the biannual puppy kicking Olympics.
Ellen reached a cold beer out of the fridge and opened it up in one smooth movement. She clunked the beer down on the bar and motioned Sam to the bar stool, “Heya, Sam.”
“Ellen,” Sam croaked out and, as Sam stepped into the full light of the bar, Ellen could see that he looked like hell. His hair needed a good wash or twelve, it lay greasy and lank against his face. His eyes had shadows so deep that Ellen saw demons reflected within them. She doubted he’d had any real sleep for at least a week.
Ellen reached underneath the bar and pulled out a bottle of whiskey before pouring a generous measure into a tumbler. She didn’t bother to add any ice before slapping it down in front of Sam, “What happened?”
Sam’s eyes dropped to the bar. He grasped ahold of the beer bottle and drained it down his throat, gulping it until the bottle was empty. As soon as the last drop drained from lip to lips he just let it drop down to the ground with a smash. He didn’t wait a breath before grabbing the whiskey and tossing that back, eyes watering from the burn. It seemed he needed all the fortification he could to get out the next words, “Dean’s dead.”
Ellen didn’t say anything though several expletives in various languages came to mind. Instead she sloshed more whiskey into his glass then served herself a generous measure, leaving the bottle on the table.
She wasn’t surprised when Sam just grabbed the bottle and started tipping the amber liquid down his throat. When he showed absolutely no sign of slowing before his liver gave up, Ellen grabbed the bottle back off him, engaging in a brief tug of water which left amber pools on the wooden bar top. She fastened the top on and tucked it back under the bar. Sam grasped the measures Ellen had poured for the both of them and knocked those down instead before lifting his head to regard Ellen balefully.
Ordinarily Ellen would punch anyone that snaked her booze but one look in desolate eyes and she just settled back on the stool behind the bar. “Drinking isn’t going to help matters, Sam.” Ellen knew her words were water off a duck’s back, “What happened?”
“Werewolf,” Sam said and the two simple syllables rang with utter hatred, the like of which Ellen had never wanted to hear in the youngest Winchester’s voice; God knows she’d heard it often enough in his Daddy’s.
Ellen winced. She’d often heard stories about werewolf victims, they usually included the words shredded, torn, ripped and mangled. The thought of that happening to Dean Winchester… Ellen retrieved the bottle from beneath the bar and served herself and Sam another shot, this time making sure she got to drink hers before Sam could steal it. “I’m sorry, Sam. You know if there’s anything I can do…”
“Can you bring my brother back?” Sam asked in what Ellen had termed his lost little boy voice and the one she had thanked God that she hadn’t had to hear too often.
“I can’t do that, Sam.”
“Then there’s nothing you can do for me.” Sam said in a voice two degrees colder than the grave.
And that was how it went for the next two months. Sam wandered out during the day, Ellen didn’t know where and didn’t want to ask. Sometimes he returned with a cut lip or bruised knuckles, sometimes with something almost approximating a smile. During the night, he drank himself into oblivion, only pausing when he turned maudlin enough to beg Ellen to bring his brother back. Shortly after that, Sam usually sagged into unconsciousness and Ellen set him up in the spare bedroom. Some of Ellen’s regulars started avoiding the bar, the image of another hunter falling to pieces too painful for their eyes.
It was two months down the line that the question changed from ‘Can you bring my brother back?’ to ‘How far is too far to go to bring my brother back?’ and that worried Ellen. It’s about that time that Sam started asking her for hunts too. Ellen was reluctant, not because she didn’t think the long-haired hunter could hunt solo, she’s sure he’s more capable than half the hunters in the bar, but because he never has.
In the end she fixed him up for a joint hunt with a hunter she trusted, Jake. The guy was used to working with a partner, his usual recently left him to go get married and have two point four children. She found them a nice milk run job, a haunting about a hundred miles south of the roadhouse, body already located just needed someone to nip down there and salt and burn.
They returned a week later. Jake had a haunted look on his face whereas Sam looked oddly exuberant, a pale shadow of the man she remembered but a present shadow nonetheless. When Sam had drunk himself into oblivion once more, Ellen turned to Jake and asked how the hunt had gone.
“Never let that boy hunt with anyone else ever again,” was all that Jake said before leaving the bar. Ellen never saw him again and last she heard, he’d settled down with a family of his own and was pretending the monsters never existed. Ellen found simple hunts for Sam and never paired him up again.
***
Then one day, Sam left. Sam went out one morning as usual and never came back in the evening. She’d scouted around the nearby area for him but he wasn’t anywhere local. She’d no idea what car he’d driven to get to the roadhouse except that it hadn’t been the Impala. She hadn’t worked up the nerve to ask the fate of Dean’s car yet.
It’d been two months since Ellen had seen Sam that she next heard about him. She was moving about the roadhouse after a busy Wednesday night, picking up the glasses that it was apparently too much effort for the hunters to return to the bar. She passed a table of familiar faces, all worn and with new injuries showing, carrying on a hushed conversation. She was about to walk straight past when she caught a single word. “Winchester.”
Now in this place, it’s always possible they’d just be talking about the rifle. A few times in the past couple of months, Ellen had done just that, eavesdropped on a conversation which turned out to be just about guns but this time, there was something in the man’s inflexion that said he was talking about a person, not a weapon. It also sounded like he was talking about a person he didn’t particularly like. Ellen paused, tray of glasses not quite quivering in her hand.
“God knows how that one turned out so bad,” She heard one of the hunters, a whipcord thin Hispanic man called Diego, say, “His father and older brother were two of the finest hunters I’d ever hoped to know.”
“Not talking ‘bout Sam Winchester, are you?” Ellen interrupted, setting her tray to rest on the edge of table, “Sure, he’s a bit shook up over his brother’s death but give him a bit of time and he’ll be back to fine.” Ellen wasn’t sure, even then, if she believed her own words.
Three sets of eyes turned to Ellen’s but it was the Diego who spoke, “Ellen, he killed Edgars.” The man’s tone was pitying.
“What?” Ellen felt the blood drain from her face and she leant against her hands on the table, eyes drifting to the empty chair at the table where the group’s fourth usually sat. A full glass of beer sat in his place, the drink for the dead: a hunter tradition. Ellen tried to re-gather herself, shaking her head, “No, Sam wouldn’t.”
“Sam did,” Diego stated in a quiet voice, pulling over a chair from a nearby table, “Maybe you should sit down.”
Ellen allowed herself to thump down into the seat. “Tell me what happened,” She demanded, making her voice as strong as she could manage.
All eyes turned to Connor, the born storyteller of the group. Every few years he would announce his retirement from hunting to write a series of novels based on the hunting life and usually less than a month later he’d be back, complaining of boredom.
Connor took in a deep breath, leaning back on his chair and settling his hands on his thighs, “It all started when Aaron received word of an incubus hunting near San Diego. The damn thing was smart, preying on old widows who were likely to die in their sleep anyway and using their money to shift himself further up society. You know when an incubus starts getting smart that the world is really going down the pisser.”
“It looked like an easy job. The four of us would stake an area, move around between the houses and keep an eye out. It was one of Edgars’ biddies that got attacked. He sent the signal up and we all converged on the thing. Unluckily it’d slipped past him and out to the woods but he’d caught its trail and left us some signs to follow. Edgars was damn wood smart,” Connor raised his glass, clinked it with the other two and drank for their missing member.
“I caught up with Edgars first but Diego and Aaron were just a footstep behind me. We converged from all sides, had the damn thing dead to rights. We should’ve guessed that something was wrong from the way that damn thing kept smirking at us, blood red lips curled up to show bright white teeth. But when Sam Winchester stepped out of the trees close by, I just thought ‘Huh, more back-up.’”
Ellen noticed Aaron catch the eye of one of the hunters at the bar and motion for a whiskey to be sent over. She was well used to the hunters serving themselves as long as they didn’t stiff her when it came to paying. When the whiskey was brought over and set in front of her though, she knew that this story was only going to get worse.
Connor paused to wet his own throat, taking a more than generous swig of his beer, “I’d never had the pleasure of hunting with a Winchester though I’d heard all the stories that circulate about them. Edgars had and he just stepped forward towards Sam, grinning in that affable way he always did. I swear the guy was more puppy than man sometimes. He called out ‘Hey, Winchester!’ and Sam turned, shotgun in hand.”
Ellen tightened her hand on the glass that she’d just been playing with and knocked back the amber-gold liquid, feeling the burn preparing her body for the hurt to come.
“I was worried that he was going to shoot straight off, he had such a determined look in his eyes. But Edgars didn’t even flinch, just smirked, ‘Easy, Winchester. Reflexes running high?’ Sam didn’t lower the shotgun though, kept it pointed at Edgars’ chest and shook his head. I don’t know what comfort it’ll be but I think I saw regret. ‘Go back,’ Sam said, ‘Just leave.’”
“Needless to say, we all weren’t so keen on that. At the time, I just figured it for Sam getting a little too possessive ‘bout his prey. We heard a few rumours about the hunt with Jake and it’s bantered about that Sam Winchester didn’t play well with others unless it was his brother, Dean, and well, that’s not really an option anymore.” To Ellen’s surprise, the three raised their glasses and clinked to Dean’s memory too, despite the fact his brother had taken one of their own.
There’d been a glass sitting at the bar for a month after Sam had given the news. She knew Sam hadn’t put it there, his father had kept the boys separate from most hunters, not passing on the traditions. She’d yet to find out who’d had but she wished it’d been her.
“Edgars still seemed convinced this was just some misunderstanding and he told Sam we could take the thing down together. That incubus just kept smiling away and that was when Sam said the words ‘I’m not here to hunt it, I’m here to protect it.’” Connors was a practiced story-teller and even a matter as serious as this couldn’t dim his art and so he paused in that moment, letting the words echo into the silent hollow they created. Another whiskey was brought to Ellen’s hand and this time she wasn’t sure who’d signalled for it, it might have even been her.
“We didn’t want to believe it,” Connor said in as voice as soft as the whispering winter wind, “We just froze in that moment, eyes on the boy and the incubus. Aaron broke the silence, demanded ‘What?’ Sam just shook his head, ‘You wouldn’t understand. Just leave now,’ he threatened, ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’”
“I’ll admit now that I laughed, I couldn’t help it. There were four of us, two of them and Sam Winchester, well, he doesn’t look like he’d say boo to a goose half the time. I was sure he was a good hunter, I’d heard the tales but his father and brother always exuded danger, Sam never did. That’s probably why Edgars felt safe, why Edgars stepped forward to take the gun away from Sam and that’s the moment that Sam pulled the trigger.” The three lifted their glasses again and this time Ellen joined them, knocking her whiskey back though the burn barely affected the numbness settling over her body now.
“I admit that what happened next is a little fuzzy but I’ll do my best to tell. It was like the sky’d just turned purple on us, you are sure that it’s happened but your brain just refuses to process the information. We all saw Edgars fall and we saw the dirt brown of the forest floor spread with red but I couldn’t move, afraid that to move would be to make it real and if I just stayed still long enough, Sam Winchester would’ve been pointing that damn rifle at the incubus. Instead he swung it back around at us but didn’t pull the trigger again, backing away into the escape route left clear by Edgars’ fall.”
“Aaron tried to help Edgars but he was already dead. Sam at least gave him a clean death. By the time we’d gathered our wits, Sam and the incubus were long gone. We burned Edgars not far from where he fell and scattered his ashes on the ashes of the home he once had then we came here.” With those words, Connor folded his hands on themselves, a tacit sign that the story was over.
Ellen leaned back on her chair, trying to ignore the tears she could feel trickling down her cheeks and hoping she’d see Sam again soon and there’d be some sort of explanation.
***
The next time Ellen saw Sam Winchester was three months later and in circumstances so ordinary that she almost didn’t believe it herself. She’d gotten a call from one of the few retired hunters who’d actually managed to stay retired. His wife had just given birth to their first child and he wanted Ellen to be one of the godparents. Ellen had driven straight there, trusting the care of the bar to one of the more steady hunters.
About an hour away from the maternity hospital, Ellen had stopped off at a small gas station to pick up some flowers and decided that the tall figure with a half-full basket looked familiar. Ellen had never been a hunter nor had she ever wanted to be but that didn’t mean she hadn’t picked up a good dollop of caution along the way. She approached slowly, giving herself a clear path to the exit before asking, “Sam?”
“Ellen!” Sam paused in popping a packet of peanut M&Ms into his basket and his expression was so open and boyish that Ellen regretted believing any of the rumours about him, “Sorry that I haven’t been to the roadhouse recently. I had a feeling certain misunderstandings meant I wouldn’t be welcome.”
“I admit there’ve been a few rumours had me concerned about you.” Ellen hedged.
“I guess things look pretty bad from an outside perspective,” Sam said, looking abashed, “Look, you got a spare hour to chat? I’m staying in a motel near here and there’s a diner close, dinner is on me.”
Ellen had made good time across country and knew the new family wouldn’t be expecting her for another couple of hours, “Sure.” She agreed.
“Okay, just let me pay for these.” Sam gestured to his basket, “I don’t want to add being a felon to my list of problems at the moment.”
Ellen wasn’t quite sure what to make of this upbeat Sam. The shadows under his eyes were gone and there was a bounce back in his step. Her hand hovered briefly to the cell phone tucked in her pocket, wondering whether back-up was a sound idea. She dismissed her suspicions, she owed the boy a chance to tell his story, and there wasn’t much likely to happen in a public place like a diner. She arranged with Sam to meet there once Sam had paid for his things and dropped them off.
The fact that the diner was busy came as a relief to Ellen, the suspicions loitering around Sam refusing to shake themselves entirely. She ordered a coffee for herself and idly perused the menu. Sam joined her about ten minutes later and grinned at the waitress with jovial familiarity, ordering himself a coffee as well before turning to Ellen and recommending the all-day breakfast, “Enough food to keep even Dean happy.”
That was when the first trickle of doubt shivered down Ellen’s spine. Maybe it’d been a mistake but Sam had referred to his brother almost in the present tense, “All-day breakfast?” She asked, trying to keep any hint of a quiver out of her voice, “Probably a little too much for me. How’s the shepherds pie?”
“Not bad. Aggie tends to mix some mint in with the lamb, makes it that bit nicer.” Sam said, “Though the carrots and peas tend to be frozen rather than fresh.”
The conversation is so banal and normal that Ellen forced back all the questions she really wanted to ask and focused instead on the trivialities, “How long have you been here?”
“About a month,” Sam replied, motioning the waitress over and placing his order for the all-day breakfast. Ellen ordered the shepherd’s pie and the waitress bustled off again, “It’s really nice here. Everyone is real friendly. Even cute waitresses for Dean.”
That was the second time and the chill in Ellen’s spine turned into a block of ice, “About Dean…” She ventures.
“He’s not here yet,” Sam said matter-of-factly, “But I’m working on it.” He took a sip of the coffee, “This is why I can talk to you. You understand about families and about the lengths you will go to for them.”
Ellen sipped her own coffee to give her mind time to percolate or rather to come up with appropriate phrasing for dissuading Sam from necromancy. For one thing, she was sure the first thing Dean would do if he came back from the dead was kick his brother’s ass for being so stupid, “I would do just about anything for Jo but sometimes you have to let them go.”
Sam frowned at Ellen, looked at her like she was a Rubik’s cube and he’s just trying to find the right angle and he’d have the solution, “You told Dean once that you would always try to protect your loved ones forever or something like that,” Sam stated in a level reasonable tone, “That’s all I’m trying to do.”
“Jo? Yes. I will try to protect her forever, as much as I can when she’s probably hundreds of miles away but forever stops the day she dies. Don’t you think I’d give almost anything to have my husband back? But I can’t and I have to face that.” Ellen tried to reason with the man seated opposite her.
“But what if you could,” Sam said and it’s so quiet that Ellen had to lean forward to hear, “Dean gave up his life for me and Dad. Why can’t me and Dad give up our deaths for him?”
“You aren’t dead, Sam.”
“Aren’t I?” Sam asked with such a flat look in his eyes that it took everything Ellen had not to run screaming out of the diner. He glanced down at his large hands, cupping them around the fragility of the coffee mug.
“No, you aren’t,” Ellen said, “Is that why you’ve been going round acting like such a damn fool? You are half-dead already so it doesn’t matter?”
Sam shook his head and looked wistfully to Ellen, “No, I really thought you’d understand. I’m doing what I’m doing because it’s the only way He’ll bring Dean back.”
Ellen got used to the way Winchesters talk over the years and one of the things she picked up was that special intonation when they talk about the demon, like they invented a whole other language similar yet achingly different to English just in order to give their family trauma its due. When Sam said He, Ellen knows exactly who he’s referring to and she shuffles back on her seat, “Sam, you can’t do that!”
Sam looked up at her, perplexed, “Why not? My dad did.”
“Your dad exchanged his life for Dean’s,” Ellen had heard the story enough times from the boys, “What you are doing… It’s worse than your death and Dean’s already dead.”
There’s a split second where Sam looked like the Sam from Ellen’s most recent memories, broken, shattered but then the mask or whatever it was that constituted Sam Winchester slide back up, “I really thought you’d understand,” He said with a sad shake of the head, “I told Him I couldn’t do it if you understood but you don’t.” Sam struck forward like a snake and Ellen found her throat caught in one of those large hands.
There were screams all around her from the fellow diners but then everything slowed and Sam’s full attention shifted back to her and to the breath-stealing pressure on her throat, “It’s alright, Ellen. Just a few more and I’ll have Dean back and then everything with be alright.” He had that puppy dog innocent expression on his face and it was so twisted even as he tightened the pressure on her throat. Ellen’s eyes dart to the sluggish patrons, desperately begging for help.
“Don’t worry,” Sam said, “They won’t remember anything.” He lifted one hand and with eerie gentility stroked her hair, “You get to be with your husband now. Tell Dean I’m doing everything I can, tell him it won’t be long.”
Ellen’s vision turned grey at the edges as her body lost the last traces of oxygen it was retaining and, as her body slowly shut down, she tried to remember the boy she once knew. “Just rest now, Ellen.” Sam’s voice soothed and Ellen obeyed.
***
The minute that Bobby’s phone rang, he knew something was very wrong. At first when it turned out to be just one of his fellow junk dogs he breathed a little easier. That was until the friend mentioned something about being called out to drag an Impala found abandoned. Bobby was in his truck and driving before his friend had time to finish what he was saying.
Within two footsteps of his buddy’s yard, he knows it was The Impala. He’d watched as Dean had built that beauty back from scratch, knowing better than to offer help. He still knew every scratch, every dent, the places Dean didn’t hammer out because that’s how they’d always been. He swore that Dean had actually purposefully dented some parts of the Impala. He didn’t rebuild an Impala, he rebuilt The Impala.
His buddy handed him a beer and didn’t talk details. He didn’t ask for money for the abandoned car nor ask whose it was. He didn’t even bat an eyelid when Bobby ripped the lurid yellow abandoned car sticker from the front windscreen and stomped it below his feet. When frustration boiled over and a few tears leak out of Bobby’s eyes, his buddy did the right thing and pretended they didn’t exist.
By the evening, Bobby was driving back to his yard with the Impala hooked carefully up to the back, making sure that no new scratches got added.
He found a cosy corner in his yard and nestled the Impala in there, making sure to wipe all the dirt from the journey off her before Bobby let himself go to bed. He said good night to her every evening before he turned in and good morning as soon as the sun was up. If he’s going to be away for a few weeks on a long hunt, he’d let her know. If he’s late back, he apologised. Sometimes Bobby wondered whether he had actually lost his mind. He kept up these rituals though because to break them was to break the hope that Sam and Dean Winchester were gonna saunter up to his doorstep and ask what the fuck Bobby was doing with their car.
It took him a long time to get around to dialling other hunters. At first, it’s all no news. No, this hunter hadn’t heard from Sam or Dean. No, they didn’t know what hunt they might have been on in the area the Impala was found. Yeah, sure, they’d let Bobby know if they hear anything. It took a while before Bobby called the road house. He knew about it for a long time, sure, but there was something about hunters all clustered together which sounded wrong to him, recipe for disaster. Plus he never appreciated Ellen blaming John for her man’s death. A hunter lives or dies by himself, ain’t nothing no-one else can do ‘bout it. It has nothing to do with the road house being about his last hope, nothing at all.
He set a beer down on the table and lined it up with another, not wanting to move from the table once he started. He dialled the number and pressed the phone too close to his ear, listening to each and every ring.
“Harvelle’s Roadhouse, Ellen speaking.”
“Hey, it’s Bobby Singer.” Bobby didn’t need to say more than that, every hunter either knew who Bobby was or had his head buried in the sand.
“Bobby,” There’s sad regret in Ellen’s voice and Bobby knew whatever she’s about to say wouldn’t be good news. He wanted to slam the phone down right there and keep pretending but Bobby has always lived in reality, a twisted and skewed reality sure, but reality nonetheless and ignoring the truth just gets you killed a bit faster, “I’m so sorry about Dean.”
The words bite through Bobby, tearing into his heart and Bobby grabbed the beer and took three long glugs, enough that he can breathe again, “What happened?” He asked, his voice gruff and harsh.
“You didn’t know?” Ellen said, a soft gasp on the line, “Oh god, I didn’t mean to tell you like that. I thought you knew, I thought Sam would have told you.”
All rumours had said Ellen was one of the most composed and together women in the hunting business so Bobby was surprised that something like this could’ve reduced her to babbling but then the Winchester boys often had that effect on anyone lucky enough to get within reaching distance of their inner circle, “Friend of mine picked up the Impala. I got it here in my yard.”
“I had wondered what had happened to it,” Ellen said but it’s not really a comment to Bobby but a fill in of the conversation, “Sam turned up here about a month back, told me Dean’s dead.”
“What?” It’s a simple question but Bobby had to force it out, wondering whether he really wanted to know.
“Werewolf.” Ellen said and Bobby let loose a stream of curses in about six different languages including Latin, Ancient Greek and a demonic tongue he’d learnt on a dare. When he ran out of words before he ran out of anger, he began making them up: guttural noises which were the closest he could come to expressing his rage. Finally he ran out of breath and he rested his head against the phone, breathing in the silence. “Yeah,” came Ellen’s quiet acknowledgment.
“How’s Sam?” Bobby asked, knowing the answer.
“A mess,” Ellen said, “I’m trying to help him but I don’t think there’s much that I can do. He’s drinking himself stupid every night, falling unconscious on the floor. I’ve no idea what he gets up to during the day and I don’t dare ask.”
Bobby winced, “You should send him up to me. I’ll look after him.”
He can almost hear Ellen’s head shake, the soft swish of hair, “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I know you and the boys were close but you are too tied to him and Dean. Sam needs to remember how to be Sam again.”
Part of Bobby acknowledges that Ellen is right, but most of him wants to see if there are any more swear words he missed out the first time. Instead he just says, “Fine,” and hung up.
***
It’s five months before Bobby called the road house again. He’d kept himself busy but stayed away from the hunting community, not wanting to see the Winchester sized hole there. Instead he’d kept angry with himself. He coped just fine before the Winchester family showed up on his doorstep and he’d do just fine after. If he still cleaned and talked to the Impala, that’s perfectly fine. She’s a sweet ride and everyone knows to take good care of fine cars.
In the end, he couldn’t resist the temptation to check up on Sam. He never quite got on as well with the younger Winchester. He liked Sam as a kid, sure enough, even if he could drive Bobby to distraction. Sam as a teenager was enough to drive the most patient man to drink and Bobby was never a patient man. Sam as a man was a conundrum, Bobby missed a lot of his formative years, only meeting him again when he was full of anger at his girlfriend’s death and at the life in general.
Bobby thought perhaps it’s his allegiance to Dean which lead to him making the call.
The voice that answered however wasn’t Ellen. It’s younger and higher, less of a southern burr to it. “Harvelle’s Roadhouse, Jo speaking.” Ellen’s daughter, Bobby never met her though he heard a rumour she’d struck out on her own.
“Jo? It’s Bobby Singer.”
“Hi,” Wariness and confusion coloured the girl’s voice and it set Bobby on edge, “What can I do for you?”
“I was kind of hoping to speak to Ellen.” Bobby replied.
There’s an indelicate snort, “You and half of the rest of us.”
“What?”
“No-one’s heard anything from my mother for about a month,” Jo said and there’s no disguising the worry that threaded its way through the girl’s voice, making her sound years younger and older at the same time.
“What happened?” Bobby asked, gruff.
“I wish I knew,” Jo had a front of bravado up, her mother’s steel showing, “She went off to visit some retired hunters, they’d just had a baby. Rang Ash when she was an hour away from there to check in and wasn’t heard from since.” There’s a pause and Bobby ignored the choked off waver he could hear, “What did you need to talk to my mother about?”
“Just wanted to check in on Sam.” Bobby answered.
There’s a long pause on the other end of the line and dread seized Bobby’s heart. “Sam?” Jo asked querulously, “You haven’t heard?”
“He’s dead?” Bobby asked.
There’s a half-hysterical snort, “No,” And Bobby could breathe again, “If only.” Bobby paused and scowled at the phone, “He’s… He’s not exactly fighting on the side of angels anymore.”
Bobby knew it was a mistake to let the boy out of his sights, “Gone off the rails a bit? Let me know where he is and I’ll knock some sense into him.”
There’s a giggle, high and fine and sounding so very wrong, “Off the rails? Sam Winchester can’t even see the fucking track anymore. He killed Jim Edgars, he’s running around protecting demons, he’s off his nut, gone completely. Most of the hunters here’d shoot him on sight.”
‘Oh god, Dean, I’m so sorry,’ Bobby wasn’t sure whether he said the words out loud but he didn’t particularly care either, “They’d have to go through me first,” Bobby growled down the phone, “I’ll find Sam and I’ll sort him out.” Or kill him myself, Bobby didn’t add, slamming the phone down on the girl on the other end. He drained both beers lined in front of him, giving the world the haze that did nothing to disguise the cold, hard truth staring him in the face.
Bobby idly ran a tally of the amount of alcohol in the house including anti-freeze for the cars and some rubbing alcohol for wounds and tried to work out if there’s actually enough to make the world go away for a while. Before he has time to finish his calculations, he heard the excited barks of his dogs outside and then there’s a scratching, light knock on the door.
Next chapter
Author: Wysawyg
Summary: Sam Winchester was beginning to wonder whether the demon had forgotten his plans for him. Sam Winchester had forgotten that the demon played a long game. Dark!fic. Multi-chapter. Not WIP.
Disclaimer: Everything the light touches belongs to someone else. The darkside too. It’s all Kripke and the guys and gals at the CW.
Warnings and notes: Multiple character death in future chapters. Dark fic.
Rating: PG-13 to R
Pairing/Characters: Mostly gen, some very mild Dean/Jo in future chapters.
Timeline: Diverges AU from season 2. Approximately after Born under a Bad Sign but before Heart.
Beta: Beta’d by the wonderful TraSan who is a wonderful writer and beta but does torture flame-retardant ducks hence proving that no-one is perfect.
Feedback: Makes the hamsters in my head dance, especially concrit.
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The minute that Sam Winchester walked into Ellen’s bar, she knew something was wrong. For one thing, as much as Ellen stared at the door, Dean Winchester didn’t materialise. For another thing, Sam was looking like he’d been a spectator at the biannual puppy kicking Olympics.
Ellen reached a cold beer out of the fridge and opened it up in one smooth movement. She clunked the beer down on the bar and motioned Sam to the bar stool, “Heya, Sam.”
“Ellen,” Sam croaked out and, as Sam stepped into the full light of the bar, Ellen could see that he looked like hell. His hair needed a good wash or twelve, it lay greasy and lank against his face. His eyes had shadows so deep that Ellen saw demons reflected within them. She doubted he’d had any real sleep for at least a week.
Ellen reached underneath the bar and pulled out a bottle of whiskey before pouring a generous measure into a tumbler. She didn’t bother to add any ice before slapping it down in front of Sam, “What happened?”
Sam’s eyes dropped to the bar. He grasped ahold of the beer bottle and drained it down his throat, gulping it until the bottle was empty. As soon as the last drop drained from lip to lips he just let it drop down to the ground with a smash. He didn’t wait a breath before grabbing the whiskey and tossing that back, eyes watering from the burn. It seemed he needed all the fortification he could to get out the next words, “Dean’s dead.”
Ellen didn’t say anything though several expletives in various languages came to mind. Instead she sloshed more whiskey into his glass then served herself a generous measure, leaving the bottle on the table.
She wasn’t surprised when Sam just grabbed the bottle and started tipping the amber liquid down his throat. When he showed absolutely no sign of slowing before his liver gave up, Ellen grabbed the bottle back off him, engaging in a brief tug of water which left amber pools on the wooden bar top. She fastened the top on and tucked it back under the bar. Sam grasped the measures Ellen had poured for the both of them and knocked those down instead before lifting his head to regard Ellen balefully.
Ordinarily Ellen would punch anyone that snaked her booze but one look in desolate eyes and she just settled back on the stool behind the bar. “Drinking isn’t going to help matters, Sam.” Ellen knew her words were water off a duck’s back, “What happened?”
“Werewolf,” Sam said and the two simple syllables rang with utter hatred, the like of which Ellen had never wanted to hear in the youngest Winchester’s voice; God knows she’d heard it often enough in his Daddy’s.
Ellen winced. She’d often heard stories about werewolf victims, they usually included the words shredded, torn, ripped and mangled. The thought of that happening to Dean Winchester… Ellen retrieved the bottle from beneath the bar and served herself and Sam another shot, this time making sure she got to drink hers before Sam could steal it. “I’m sorry, Sam. You know if there’s anything I can do…”
“Can you bring my brother back?” Sam asked in what Ellen had termed his lost little boy voice and the one she had thanked God that she hadn’t had to hear too often.
“I can’t do that, Sam.”
“Then there’s nothing you can do for me.” Sam said in a voice two degrees colder than the grave.
And that was how it went for the next two months. Sam wandered out during the day, Ellen didn’t know where and didn’t want to ask. Sometimes he returned with a cut lip or bruised knuckles, sometimes with something almost approximating a smile. During the night, he drank himself into oblivion, only pausing when he turned maudlin enough to beg Ellen to bring his brother back. Shortly after that, Sam usually sagged into unconsciousness and Ellen set him up in the spare bedroom. Some of Ellen’s regulars started avoiding the bar, the image of another hunter falling to pieces too painful for their eyes.
It was two months down the line that the question changed from ‘Can you bring my brother back?’ to ‘How far is too far to go to bring my brother back?’ and that worried Ellen. It’s about that time that Sam started asking her for hunts too. Ellen was reluctant, not because she didn’t think the long-haired hunter could hunt solo, she’s sure he’s more capable than half the hunters in the bar, but because he never has.
In the end she fixed him up for a joint hunt with a hunter she trusted, Jake. The guy was used to working with a partner, his usual recently left him to go get married and have two point four children. She found them a nice milk run job, a haunting about a hundred miles south of the roadhouse, body already located just needed someone to nip down there and salt and burn.
They returned a week later. Jake had a haunted look on his face whereas Sam looked oddly exuberant, a pale shadow of the man she remembered but a present shadow nonetheless. When Sam had drunk himself into oblivion once more, Ellen turned to Jake and asked how the hunt had gone.
“Never let that boy hunt with anyone else ever again,” was all that Jake said before leaving the bar. Ellen never saw him again and last she heard, he’d settled down with a family of his own and was pretending the monsters never existed. Ellen found simple hunts for Sam and never paired him up again.
***
Then one day, Sam left. Sam went out one morning as usual and never came back in the evening. She’d scouted around the nearby area for him but he wasn’t anywhere local. She’d no idea what car he’d driven to get to the roadhouse except that it hadn’t been the Impala. She hadn’t worked up the nerve to ask the fate of Dean’s car yet.
It’d been two months since Ellen had seen Sam that she next heard about him. She was moving about the roadhouse after a busy Wednesday night, picking up the glasses that it was apparently too much effort for the hunters to return to the bar. She passed a table of familiar faces, all worn and with new injuries showing, carrying on a hushed conversation. She was about to walk straight past when she caught a single word. “Winchester.”
Now in this place, it’s always possible they’d just be talking about the rifle. A few times in the past couple of months, Ellen had done just that, eavesdropped on a conversation which turned out to be just about guns but this time, there was something in the man’s inflexion that said he was talking about a person, not a weapon. It also sounded like he was talking about a person he didn’t particularly like. Ellen paused, tray of glasses not quite quivering in her hand.
“God knows how that one turned out so bad,” She heard one of the hunters, a whipcord thin Hispanic man called Diego, say, “His father and older brother were two of the finest hunters I’d ever hoped to know.”
“Not talking ‘bout Sam Winchester, are you?” Ellen interrupted, setting her tray to rest on the edge of table, “Sure, he’s a bit shook up over his brother’s death but give him a bit of time and he’ll be back to fine.” Ellen wasn’t sure, even then, if she believed her own words.
Three sets of eyes turned to Ellen’s but it was the Diego who spoke, “Ellen, he killed Edgars.” The man’s tone was pitying.
“What?” Ellen felt the blood drain from her face and she leant against her hands on the table, eyes drifting to the empty chair at the table where the group’s fourth usually sat. A full glass of beer sat in his place, the drink for the dead: a hunter tradition. Ellen tried to re-gather herself, shaking her head, “No, Sam wouldn’t.”
“Sam did,” Diego stated in a quiet voice, pulling over a chair from a nearby table, “Maybe you should sit down.”
Ellen allowed herself to thump down into the seat. “Tell me what happened,” She demanded, making her voice as strong as she could manage.
All eyes turned to Connor, the born storyteller of the group. Every few years he would announce his retirement from hunting to write a series of novels based on the hunting life and usually less than a month later he’d be back, complaining of boredom.
Connor took in a deep breath, leaning back on his chair and settling his hands on his thighs, “It all started when Aaron received word of an incubus hunting near San Diego. The damn thing was smart, preying on old widows who were likely to die in their sleep anyway and using their money to shift himself further up society. You know when an incubus starts getting smart that the world is really going down the pisser.”
“It looked like an easy job. The four of us would stake an area, move around between the houses and keep an eye out. It was one of Edgars’ biddies that got attacked. He sent the signal up and we all converged on the thing. Unluckily it’d slipped past him and out to the woods but he’d caught its trail and left us some signs to follow. Edgars was damn wood smart,” Connor raised his glass, clinked it with the other two and drank for their missing member.
“I caught up with Edgars first but Diego and Aaron were just a footstep behind me. We converged from all sides, had the damn thing dead to rights. We should’ve guessed that something was wrong from the way that damn thing kept smirking at us, blood red lips curled up to show bright white teeth. But when Sam Winchester stepped out of the trees close by, I just thought ‘Huh, more back-up.’”
Ellen noticed Aaron catch the eye of one of the hunters at the bar and motion for a whiskey to be sent over. She was well used to the hunters serving themselves as long as they didn’t stiff her when it came to paying. When the whiskey was brought over and set in front of her though, she knew that this story was only going to get worse.
Connor paused to wet his own throat, taking a more than generous swig of his beer, “I’d never had the pleasure of hunting with a Winchester though I’d heard all the stories that circulate about them. Edgars had and he just stepped forward towards Sam, grinning in that affable way he always did. I swear the guy was more puppy than man sometimes. He called out ‘Hey, Winchester!’ and Sam turned, shotgun in hand.”
Ellen tightened her hand on the glass that she’d just been playing with and knocked back the amber-gold liquid, feeling the burn preparing her body for the hurt to come.
“I was worried that he was going to shoot straight off, he had such a determined look in his eyes. But Edgars didn’t even flinch, just smirked, ‘Easy, Winchester. Reflexes running high?’ Sam didn’t lower the shotgun though, kept it pointed at Edgars’ chest and shook his head. I don’t know what comfort it’ll be but I think I saw regret. ‘Go back,’ Sam said, ‘Just leave.’”
“Needless to say, we all weren’t so keen on that. At the time, I just figured it for Sam getting a little too possessive ‘bout his prey. We heard a few rumours about the hunt with Jake and it’s bantered about that Sam Winchester didn’t play well with others unless it was his brother, Dean, and well, that’s not really an option anymore.” To Ellen’s surprise, the three raised their glasses and clinked to Dean’s memory too, despite the fact his brother had taken one of their own.
There’d been a glass sitting at the bar for a month after Sam had given the news. She knew Sam hadn’t put it there, his father had kept the boys separate from most hunters, not passing on the traditions. She’d yet to find out who’d had but she wished it’d been her.
“Edgars still seemed convinced this was just some misunderstanding and he told Sam we could take the thing down together. That incubus just kept smiling away and that was when Sam said the words ‘I’m not here to hunt it, I’m here to protect it.’” Connors was a practiced story-teller and even a matter as serious as this couldn’t dim his art and so he paused in that moment, letting the words echo into the silent hollow they created. Another whiskey was brought to Ellen’s hand and this time she wasn’t sure who’d signalled for it, it might have even been her.
“We didn’t want to believe it,” Connor said in as voice as soft as the whispering winter wind, “We just froze in that moment, eyes on the boy and the incubus. Aaron broke the silence, demanded ‘What?’ Sam just shook his head, ‘You wouldn’t understand. Just leave now,’ he threatened, ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’”
“I’ll admit now that I laughed, I couldn’t help it. There were four of us, two of them and Sam Winchester, well, he doesn’t look like he’d say boo to a goose half the time. I was sure he was a good hunter, I’d heard the tales but his father and brother always exuded danger, Sam never did. That’s probably why Edgars felt safe, why Edgars stepped forward to take the gun away from Sam and that’s the moment that Sam pulled the trigger.” The three lifted their glasses again and this time Ellen joined them, knocking her whiskey back though the burn barely affected the numbness settling over her body now.
“I admit that what happened next is a little fuzzy but I’ll do my best to tell. It was like the sky’d just turned purple on us, you are sure that it’s happened but your brain just refuses to process the information. We all saw Edgars fall and we saw the dirt brown of the forest floor spread with red but I couldn’t move, afraid that to move would be to make it real and if I just stayed still long enough, Sam Winchester would’ve been pointing that damn rifle at the incubus. Instead he swung it back around at us but didn’t pull the trigger again, backing away into the escape route left clear by Edgars’ fall.”
“Aaron tried to help Edgars but he was already dead. Sam at least gave him a clean death. By the time we’d gathered our wits, Sam and the incubus were long gone. We burned Edgars not far from where he fell and scattered his ashes on the ashes of the home he once had then we came here.” With those words, Connor folded his hands on themselves, a tacit sign that the story was over.
Ellen leaned back on her chair, trying to ignore the tears she could feel trickling down her cheeks and hoping she’d see Sam again soon and there’d be some sort of explanation.
***
The next time Ellen saw Sam Winchester was three months later and in circumstances so ordinary that she almost didn’t believe it herself. She’d gotten a call from one of the few retired hunters who’d actually managed to stay retired. His wife had just given birth to their first child and he wanted Ellen to be one of the godparents. Ellen had driven straight there, trusting the care of the bar to one of the more steady hunters.
About an hour away from the maternity hospital, Ellen had stopped off at a small gas station to pick up some flowers and decided that the tall figure with a half-full basket looked familiar. Ellen had never been a hunter nor had she ever wanted to be but that didn’t mean she hadn’t picked up a good dollop of caution along the way. She approached slowly, giving herself a clear path to the exit before asking, “Sam?”
“Ellen!” Sam paused in popping a packet of peanut M&Ms into his basket and his expression was so open and boyish that Ellen regretted believing any of the rumours about him, “Sorry that I haven’t been to the roadhouse recently. I had a feeling certain misunderstandings meant I wouldn’t be welcome.”
“I admit there’ve been a few rumours had me concerned about you.” Ellen hedged.
“I guess things look pretty bad from an outside perspective,” Sam said, looking abashed, “Look, you got a spare hour to chat? I’m staying in a motel near here and there’s a diner close, dinner is on me.”
Ellen had made good time across country and knew the new family wouldn’t be expecting her for another couple of hours, “Sure.” She agreed.
“Okay, just let me pay for these.” Sam gestured to his basket, “I don’t want to add being a felon to my list of problems at the moment.”
Ellen wasn’t quite sure what to make of this upbeat Sam. The shadows under his eyes were gone and there was a bounce back in his step. Her hand hovered briefly to the cell phone tucked in her pocket, wondering whether back-up was a sound idea. She dismissed her suspicions, she owed the boy a chance to tell his story, and there wasn’t much likely to happen in a public place like a diner. She arranged with Sam to meet there once Sam had paid for his things and dropped them off.
The fact that the diner was busy came as a relief to Ellen, the suspicions loitering around Sam refusing to shake themselves entirely. She ordered a coffee for herself and idly perused the menu. Sam joined her about ten minutes later and grinned at the waitress with jovial familiarity, ordering himself a coffee as well before turning to Ellen and recommending the all-day breakfast, “Enough food to keep even Dean happy.”
That was when the first trickle of doubt shivered down Ellen’s spine. Maybe it’d been a mistake but Sam had referred to his brother almost in the present tense, “All-day breakfast?” She asked, trying to keep any hint of a quiver out of her voice, “Probably a little too much for me. How’s the shepherds pie?”
“Not bad. Aggie tends to mix some mint in with the lamb, makes it that bit nicer.” Sam said, “Though the carrots and peas tend to be frozen rather than fresh.”
The conversation is so banal and normal that Ellen forced back all the questions she really wanted to ask and focused instead on the trivialities, “How long have you been here?”
“About a month,” Sam replied, motioning the waitress over and placing his order for the all-day breakfast. Ellen ordered the shepherd’s pie and the waitress bustled off again, “It’s really nice here. Everyone is real friendly. Even cute waitresses for Dean.”
That was the second time and the chill in Ellen’s spine turned into a block of ice, “About Dean…” She ventures.
“He’s not here yet,” Sam said matter-of-factly, “But I’m working on it.” He took a sip of the coffee, “This is why I can talk to you. You understand about families and about the lengths you will go to for them.”
Ellen sipped her own coffee to give her mind time to percolate or rather to come up with appropriate phrasing for dissuading Sam from necromancy. For one thing, she was sure the first thing Dean would do if he came back from the dead was kick his brother’s ass for being so stupid, “I would do just about anything for Jo but sometimes you have to let them go.”
Sam frowned at Ellen, looked at her like she was a Rubik’s cube and he’s just trying to find the right angle and he’d have the solution, “You told Dean once that you would always try to protect your loved ones forever or something like that,” Sam stated in a level reasonable tone, “That’s all I’m trying to do.”
“Jo? Yes. I will try to protect her forever, as much as I can when she’s probably hundreds of miles away but forever stops the day she dies. Don’t you think I’d give almost anything to have my husband back? But I can’t and I have to face that.” Ellen tried to reason with the man seated opposite her.
“But what if you could,” Sam said and it’s so quiet that Ellen had to lean forward to hear, “Dean gave up his life for me and Dad. Why can’t me and Dad give up our deaths for him?”
“You aren’t dead, Sam.”
“Aren’t I?” Sam asked with such a flat look in his eyes that it took everything Ellen had not to run screaming out of the diner. He glanced down at his large hands, cupping them around the fragility of the coffee mug.
“No, you aren’t,” Ellen said, “Is that why you’ve been going round acting like such a damn fool? You are half-dead already so it doesn’t matter?”
Sam shook his head and looked wistfully to Ellen, “No, I really thought you’d understand. I’m doing what I’m doing because it’s the only way He’ll bring Dean back.”
Ellen got used to the way Winchesters talk over the years and one of the things she picked up was that special intonation when they talk about the demon, like they invented a whole other language similar yet achingly different to English just in order to give their family trauma its due. When Sam said He, Ellen knows exactly who he’s referring to and she shuffles back on her seat, “Sam, you can’t do that!”
Sam looked up at her, perplexed, “Why not? My dad did.”
“Your dad exchanged his life for Dean’s,” Ellen had heard the story enough times from the boys, “What you are doing… It’s worse than your death and Dean’s already dead.”
There’s a split second where Sam looked like the Sam from Ellen’s most recent memories, broken, shattered but then the mask or whatever it was that constituted Sam Winchester slide back up, “I really thought you’d understand,” He said with a sad shake of the head, “I told Him I couldn’t do it if you understood but you don’t.” Sam struck forward like a snake and Ellen found her throat caught in one of those large hands.
There were screams all around her from the fellow diners but then everything slowed and Sam’s full attention shifted back to her and to the breath-stealing pressure on her throat, “It’s alright, Ellen. Just a few more and I’ll have Dean back and then everything with be alright.” He had that puppy dog innocent expression on his face and it was so twisted even as he tightened the pressure on her throat. Ellen’s eyes dart to the sluggish patrons, desperately begging for help.
“Don’t worry,” Sam said, “They won’t remember anything.” He lifted one hand and with eerie gentility stroked her hair, “You get to be with your husband now. Tell Dean I’m doing everything I can, tell him it won’t be long.”
Ellen’s vision turned grey at the edges as her body lost the last traces of oxygen it was retaining and, as her body slowly shut down, she tried to remember the boy she once knew. “Just rest now, Ellen.” Sam’s voice soothed and Ellen obeyed.
***
The minute that Bobby’s phone rang, he knew something was very wrong. At first when it turned out to be just one of his fellow junk dogs he breathed a little easier. That was until the friend mentioned something about being called out to drag an Impala found abandoned. Bobby was in his truck and driving before his friend had time to finish what he was saying.
Within two footsteps of his buddy’s yard, he knows it was The Impala. He’d watched as Dean had built that beauty back from scratch, knowing better than to offer help. He still knew every scratch, every dent, the places Dean didn’t hammer out because that’s how they’d always been. He swore that Dean had actually purposefully dented some parts of the Impala. He didn’t rebuild an Impala, he rebuilt The Impala.
His buddy handed him a beer and didn’t talk details. He didn’t ask for money for the abandoned car nor ask whose it was. He didn’t even bat an eyelid when Bobby ripped the lurid yellow abandoned car sticker from the front windscreen and stomped it below his feet. When frustration boiled over and a few tears leak out of Bobby’s eyes, his buddy did the right thing and pretended they didn’t exist.
By the evening, Bobby was driving back to his yard with the Impala hooked carefully up to the back, making sure that no new scratches got added.
He found a cosy corner in his yard and nestled the Impala in there, making sure to wipe all the dirt from the journey off her before Bobby let himself go to bed. He said good night to her every evening before he turned in and good morning as soon as the sun was up. If he’s going to be away for a few weeks on a long hunt, he’d let her know. If he’s late back, he apologised. Sometimes Bobby wondered whether he had actually lost his mind. He kept up these rituals though because to break them was to break the hope that Sam and Dean Winchester were gonna saunter up to his doorstep and ask what the fuck Bobby was doing with their car.
It took him a long time to get around to dialling other hunters. At first, it’s all no news. No, this hunter hadn’t heard from Sam or Dean. No, they didn’t know what hunt they might have been on in the area the Impala was found. Yeah, sure, they’d let Bobby know if they hear anything. It took a while before Bobby called the road house. He knew about it for a long time, sure, but there was something about hunters all clustered together which sounded wrong to him, recipe for disaster. Plus he never appreciated Ellen blaming John for her man’s death. A hunter lives or dies by himself, ain’t nothing no-one else can do ‘bout it. It has nothing to do with the road house being about his last hope, nothing at all.
He set a beer down on the table and lined it up with another, not wanting to move from the table once he started. He dialled the number and pressed the phone too close to his ear, listening to each and every ring.
“Harvelle’s Roadhouse, Ellen speaking.”
“Hey, it’s Bobby Singer.” Bobby didn’t need to say more than that, every hunter either knew who Bobby was or had his head buried in the sand.
“Bobby,” There’s sad regret in Ellen’s voice and Bobby knew whatever she’s about to say wouldn’t be good news. He wanted to slam the phone down right there and keep pretending but Bobby has always lived in reality, a twisted and skewed reality sure, but reality nonetheless and ignoring the truth just gets you killed a bit faster, “I’m so sorry about Dean.”
The words bite through Bobby, tearing into his heart and Bobby grabbed the beer and took three long glugs, enough that he can breathe again, “What happened?” He asked, his voice gruff and harsh.
“You didn’t know?” Ellen said, a soft gasp on the line, “Oh god, I didn’t mean to tell you like that. I thought you knew, I thought Sam would have told you.”
All rumours had said Ellen was one of the most composed and together women in the hunting business so Bobby was surprised that something like this could’ve reduced her to babbling but then the Winchester boys often had that effect on anyone lucky enough to get within reaching distance of their inner circle, “Friend of mine picked up the Impala. I got it here in my yard.”
“I had wondered what had happened to it,” Ellen said but it’s not really a comment to Bobby but a fill in of the conversation, “Sam turned up here about a month back, told me Dean’s dead.”
“What?” It’s a simple question but Bobby had to force it out, wondering whether he really wanted to know.
“Werewolf.” Ellen said and Bobby let loose a stream of curses in about six different languages including Latin, Ancient Greek and a demonic tongue he’d learnt on a dare. When he ran out of words before he ran out of anger, he began making them up: guttural noises which were the closest he could come to expressing his rage. Finally he ran out of breath and he rested his head against the phone, breathing in the silence. “Yeah,” came Ellen’s quiet acknowledgment.
“How’s Sam?” Bobby asked, knowing the answer.
“A mess,” Ellen said, “I’m trying to help him but I don’t think there’s much that I can do. He’s drinking himself stupid every night, falling unconscious on the floor. I’ve no idea what he gets up to during the day and I don’t dare ask.”
Bobby winced, “You should send him up to me. I’ll look after him.”
He can almost hear Ellen’s head shake, the soft swish of hair, “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I know you and the boys were close but you are too tied to him and Dean. Sam needs to remember how to be Sam again.”
Part of Bobby acknowledges that Ellen is right, but most of him wants to see if there are any more swear words he missed out the first time. Instead he just says, “Fine,” and hung up.
***
It’s five months before Bobby called the road house again. He’d kept himself busy but stayed away from the hunting community, not wanting to see the Winchester sized hole there. Instead he’d kept angry with himself. He coped just fine before the Winchester family showed up on his doorstep and he’d do just fine after. If he still cleaned and talked to the Impala, that’s perfectly fine. She’s a sweet ride and everyone knows to take good care of fine cars.
In the end, he couldn’t resist the temptation to check up on Sam. He never quite got on as well with the younger Winchester. He liked Sam as a kid, sure enough, even if he could drive Bobby to distraction. Sam as a teenager was enough to drive the most patient man to drink and Bobby was never a patient man. Sam as a man was a conundrum, Bobby missed a lot of his formative years, only meeting him again when he was full of anger at his girlfriend’s death and at the life in general.
Bobby thought perhaps it’s his allegiance to Dean which lead to him making the call.
The voice that answered however wasn’t Ellen. It’s younger and higher, less of a southern burr to it. “Harvelle’s Roadhouse, Jo speaking.” Ellen’s daughter, Bobby never met her though he heard a rumour she’d struck out on her own.
“Jo? It’s Bobby Singer.”
“Hi,” Wariness and confusion coloured the girl’s voice and it set Bobby on edge, “What can I do for you?”
“I was kind of hoping to speak to Ellen.” Bobby replied.
There’s an indelicate snort, “You and half of the rest of us.”
“What?”
“No-one’s heard anything from my mother for about a month,” Jo said and there’s no disguising the worry that threaded its way through the girl’s voice, making her sound years younger and older at the same time.
“What happened?” Bobby asked, gruff.
“I wish I knew,” Jo had a front of bravado up, her mother’s steel showing, “She went off to visit some retired hunters, they’d just had a baby. Rang Ash when she was an hour away from there to check in and wasn’t heard from since.” There’s a pause and Bobby ignored the choked off waver he could hear, “What did you need to talk to my mother about?”
“Just wanted to check in on Sam.” Bobby answered.
There’s a long pause on the other end of the line and dread seized Bobby’s heart. “Sam?” Jo asked querulously, “You haven’t heard?”
“He’s dead?” Bobby asked.
There’s a half-hysterical snort, “No,” And Bobby could breathe again, “If only.” Bobby paused and scowled at the phone, “He’s… He’s not exactly fighting on the side of angels anymore.”
Bobby knew it was a mistake to let the boy out of his sights, “Gone off the rails a bit? Let me know where he is and I’ll knock some sense into him.”
There’s a giggle, high and fine and sounding so very wrong, “Off the rails? Sam Winchester can’t even see the fucking track anymore. He killed Jim Edgars, he’s running around protecting demons, he’s off his nut, gone completely. Most of the hunters here’d shoot him on sight.”
‘Oh god, Dean, I’m so sorry,’ Bobby wasn’t sure whether he said the words out loud but he didn’t particularly care either, “They’d have to go through me first,” Bobby growled down the phone, “I’ll find Sam and I’ll sort him out.” Or kill him myself, Bobby didn’t add, slamming the phone down on the girl on the other end. He drained both beers lined in front of him, giving the world the haze that did nothing to disguise the cold, hard truth staring him in the face.
Bobby idly ran a tally of the amount of alcohol in the house including anti-freeze for the cars and some rubbing alcohol for wounds and tried to work out if there’s actually enough to make the world go away for a while. Before he has time to finish his calculations, he heard the excited barks of his dogs outside and then there’s a scratching, light knock on the door.
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