Best Laid Schemes (5/10)
Sam couldn't fall asleep that night, and it wasn't just the worry that kept him awake. Dean was noisy in the bed next to him, moving around every five minutes or so, seemingly unable to get comfortable. He kept clearing his throat, coughing as quietly as possible into his fist so that Sam wouldn't hear.
After nearly two hours of lying in bed, listening to his brother suffer, Sam sat up and turned on the lights. Dean was lying on his side, his legs pulled up near his stomach, his blanket discarded on the floor. He squinted back at Sam, obviously confused as to why his brother was even awake right now. "Sam?" he croaked, "the hell? Turn the light off."
Sam didn't listen, instead climbing out of bed and going over to the bags he had left on the table earlier. "That cough sounds awful, Dean. And we both need to get some sleep, so stop being stubborn and let me help you."
Dean looked vaguely amused, but didn't argue. Instead he cleared his throat again, more loudly now that he didn't have to worry about waking his brother. "It's not the cough," he told Sam, his voice low and gravelly. "My throat's killing me." He pushed himself up into a semi-sitting position, leaning on one arm and squinting at Sam, his eyes still adjusting to the light.
Sam stopped looking in the bags and looked over at his brother, surprised at the admission. "Do you think you have strep?" Dean shrugged noncommittally, swallowing hard and grimacing. Realizing Dean probably wouldn't know if he had strep, Sam continued prodding. "You had a bad case a few weeks before I left for school - does it feel like that?"
Dean shook his head slightly, remembering how awful it had been that time. He'd barely been able to eat or drink anything for nearly two weeks. This was bad but manageable. "No, that was worse," he admitted.
"When did your throat start hurting?"
"Like this?" Dean asked, putting a hand to his throat when he swallowed. "Just a couple of hours ago." He felt a tickle in the back of his throat and tried to stifle the cough, but it was useless. Dean coughed raggedly into his hand, gripping the edge of the bed sheets as each cough seemed to tear at his throat. "That…" he gasped once the coughing had subsided, "sucked."
Sam was studying him closely. "So it's a sore throat and cough. Man you just can't do anything half-way, can you?"
Dean shrugged. "At least the headache's not so bad anymore."
Sam huffed out a laugh. "Add that to the list, huh? I've got some stuff here for your throat," he told Dean, pulling out a bottle. "And another for the cough. Is there anything else I should know about? You still feel nauseous?"
Dean held up a hand and gave a so-so gesture. "Not like before, but I definitely don't think I'll be up for pizza next time you guys order."
"You coulda had soup."
"You know I hate soup," Dean growled, yanking one of the bottles from Sam and taking a swig.
"Dude!" Sam grabbed for the bottle. "What the hell? You can't just chug it down like that, jerk." He held the other bottle out of Dean's reach and measured out the dosage, handing it to his brother. "You're like a child."
Dean grinned, knocking back the cap-full that Sam handed him. "You're too straight-edged."
"I think you mean responsible."
"Uptight."
"Whatever," Sam said, exasperated. He put the caps back on the medicine bottles and put them with the rest of the things he'd bought at the drug store.
"What time is it?" Dean asked groggily, not bothering to look back at the clock on the side table.
"3:15...shit. We have to meet Mark at 7. Did you get any sleep at all?"
Dean shook his head. "But I slept practically all day. I'm good," he assured Sam, though the fact the he seemed barely able to keep his eyes open completely undermined that statement. "What about you?"
Sam shrugged. "I'll be okay. I perfected the art of pulling all-nighters at Stanford, so 3 hours of sleep is nothing new," he assured Dean, though if he was being honest, the accumulative effect of the lack of sleep this past month was starting to catch up with him. But one more night or week wouldn't matter. "But you should try and go to sleep now. Three hours is better than nothing."
Dean agreed and lay back against the pillows. Whatever shit Sam had given him seemed to be helping a little. If nothing else it was making him even drowsier. He was asleep within minutes. Sam watched as his brother fell back into a fitful slumber, closing his own eyes and trying his best to get some sleep.
He was just beginning to fall into a deep sleep when a banging on the hotel door startled him awake. Sam frowned at the blinking digits on the clock that read 6 AM. "The hell?" he muttered, reluctantly pulling himself up. A quick glance at Dean's bed showed his brother, thankfully, still asleep.
Sam looked through the peephole to see Mark, fully dressed and obviously ready to hunt. Sam quickly unlocked the door, opening it before Mark had a chance to bang again. "I thought you said seven," Sam knew his tone was accusatory, but he was slightly annoyed that he'd been robbed of sleep time, however minuscule it may have been.
Mark looked past Sam to Dean still asleep in his bed and he kept his voice low. "There's been another accident, this time at the construction site. I heard it on my scanner about 30 minutes ago."
Sam rubbed a hand through his hair, suddenly very much awake. "Why were they doing construction at 5 in the morning?"
Mark shrugged. "They may have just been preparing the site for the day. Either way, there are two people dead and one in critical condition at the hospital."
Sam cursed softly. "How'd they die?"
"Scaffolding fell on them. The guy who called 911 was pretty hysterical. He said some freak wind kicked up out of nowhere and knocked the thing over."
"Emily said she thought a few of the men she saw moving the bodies were construction workers. I wonder if they were the ones killed."
"Or if they had something against the men killed. Either way we should go check it out before word of this spreads."
"What about Dean?" Sam asked, motioning towards his brother.
Mark looked over at Dean's prone form. "Ideally I'd say let him sleep. But you know how pissed he'll be if he wakes up and you're not here." Sam nodded. Pissed and worried. "I think we should wake him up. At least then we can keep an eye on him."
Sam agreed. He went to his own bed and got a pillow off of it.
"What's that for?" Mark asked as Sam approached the bed with the pillow raised.
Sam didn't answer, but gently shook his brother's shoulder, saying his name a few times. Dean predictably lashed out, but Sam deftly moved the pillow to block the blow. He could hear Mark laughing behind him and couldn't help but laugh with him. Dean glared at Sam, then at Mark standing behind him. "What the eff?" he groaned. "I just fell asleep."
"Duty calls. There was another accident this morning."
Dean looked over at Mark and began to sit up. "Where?"
"The construction site. I'll fill you in on the way over. Both of you need to get ready. I'll go get us some coffee." Mark was out the door before Dean was even fully vertical, and the second he left Dean slumped back against the pillows.
"You sure you're up to coming?"
Dean glared at his brother again. "Yes. I'm just not awake yet."
"How's your throat feel?"
Dean seemed to think about that for a moment, putting a hand to his throat and swallowing. "Feels a little better," he admitted. "Do you have more of that red stuff?"
"Yeah." Sam got up and measured out the dosage before handing it to his brother, not trusting that he wouldn't just chug it like before. Dean quickly downed the dose and handed the measuring cup back to Sam. "Do you want the stuff for your cough?"
Dean shook his head. "Maybe later. Feel okay now."
"Alright, well get ready. Mark should be back any minute."
Sam waited until he saw Dean get out of bed before he headed into the bathroom to shower and change.
The second Sam was out of sight Dean wiped a hand down his face, slicking away the moisture that was there. He could tell he had a fever and the meds he'd been taking since yesterday hadn't seemed to have any real effect, so he grabbed some Tylenol, quickly dry-swallowing four pills. He opened his duffel, pulling out jeans and a plaid shirt and tugging them on, groaning at the persistent ache in his joints.
Dean looked towards the bathroom, listening to the sounds of Sam's electric razor. His eyes began to droop and he was forced to shake himself awake more than once until he finally gave up and lay down on his bed.
Sam finished brushing his teeth and stepped out of the bathroom, immediately seeing Dean passed out on his bed. "Dean!" To his brother's credit, Dean did open his eyes immediately at Sam's yell.
"I'm awake," he insisted, sitting up again.
"You're still tired?"
"It's 6 am in the fucking morning, Sam. Of course I'm still tired."
Sam didn't voice his concern that Dean had practically been sleeping non-stop since they got to New Paltz, and he knew better than to suggest Dean stay here again. "Touché. Are you ready then?"
Dean nodded. "Just gonna brush my teeth and hit the head." He pushed past Sam, closing the bathroom door.
Mark returned with the coffee just as Dean was getting out of the bathroom. "Thank God," Dean sighed, grabbing one of the coffees and taking a big sip.
"Thanks Mark," Sam said, taking his own cup. "Did you hear anything else about the accident?"
"The coffee shop was actually pretty crowded, but no one really knew any more than I already did. There was speculation that the two men killed were Anthony Spitz and Peter Rushmore, though. I don't think that is much help to us until we find out who those two men are and what their role is in this whole Indian burial thing."
"Then what are we waiting for?" Dean asked, trying to hide his tiredness. "Let's roll."
Flashing lights surrounded the construction site that was now teeming with law enforcement officers and news reporters. After a brief argument, Sam finally agreed that the best plan was to split up, even though it looked like Dean would collapse at any moment. Still, treating his brother like an invalid wasn't going to get them anywhere, and Sam figured if he gave a little now, he could pull some rank later on when Dean got worse. And he had no doubt in his mind that whatever this illness was, it was going to get worse before it got better.
Pushing aside his concerns for the moment, Sam approached one of the officers. Dean had set off to see if he could gather any information from the reporters, and Mark's plan was to sneak onto the accident scene to try and see if he could gather any evidence. Pulling out his most-recent FBI badge, Sam did his best to sound authoritative.
"Officer, a word?" The cop, a young kid who couldn't have been older than 22, looked suitably disturbed by the crime scene. Sam almost felt bad at how easy it was to convince him to talk. As soon as he flashed his badge, the cop - Officer Spagnola - was more than willing to tell Sam everything he knew.
Unfortunately, that turned out to be not that much. But the kid was a local, and did provide one interesting tidbit of information. Although a good number of the construction workers were contracted out from a larger company a few towns over, the two men who had been killed - Spitz and Rushmore, as Spagnola confirmed - were both locals, born-and-bred in the small town of New Paltz. It wasn't much, but it was something.
Dean didn't fare much better than Sam did, though he did come back with some hot reporter's number. How he managed to get anyone's number looking as bad as he did right now was a mystery to Sam. "Any luck?" Dean asked, and Sam almost winced at how raw his voice sounded.
"Not really. Though the two men killed were locals, if that helps."
Dean shrugged. "It's something."
"Yeah, it's something. Have you seen Mark?" Sam looked around as he asked that, squinting against the sun to see if he could make out the older hunter in the crowd.
Dean shook his head. "I'm sure he'll be back soon."
It was another fifteen minutes before Mark returned, and Dean had started to shiver slightly. Sam frowned. It was pretty warm out, especially in the sun, but Dean was quaking like it was ten below. He was just about to offer Dean his coat when Mark approached them, breathing heavily as if he'd been in a hurry to get away from someone. Or something.
"What'd you find?" the brothers asked simultaneously.
Mark chuckled. "Trouble." He motioned to an angry-looking cop who had almost caught up by then.
"Sir…" the cop began, clearly about to scold Mark or ticket him.
Sam stepped forward, pulling out his badge. "He's with me," he explained, all authoritative-like.
"Then why did he run?"
Mark spoke up then, "I'm sorry, Officer. I just wanted to get a better look at the crime scene. I'm a private investigator but I sometimes work with the FBI and I knew you probably wouldn't believe unless he," Mark motioned to Sam, "confirmed it. Sorry for trespassing on the crime scene."
The officer looked like he was going to protest, but Sam clearly looked convincing. "Alright then, but if I catch you disturbing another one of my scenes, FBI consultant or not, I will throw you in jail."
Mark nodded. "Duly noted."
The officer turned to leave, but Sam stopped him. "Was this just an accident?"
He turned back to Sam, giving him a suspicious look. "Why do you ask, son?" Apparently FBI or not, the man was determined to pull rank.
"It's just, there have been a lot of accidents around here lately, don't you think?"
The officer shrugged, his expression not giving anything away. "This town is rich with history," he said simply, then turned and walked back to the scene.
"What the fuck?" Dean croaked. "Could he be more unhelpful?"
"The townspeople probably don't take well to outsiders," Sam suggested.
Dean shivered again. "This place reminds me of Burkittsville. Those people were crazy."
Sam chuckled. "Yeah and they hated you. Better be on your best behavior here, Dean."
"Fuck you."
"Boys," Mark interrupted. "I'm starving - let's go to the local diner. Maybe these locals won't help us, but I've always found that the people in customer service positions love to please. Maybe we'll find a helpful waitress."
Dean smirked. "God I hope so."