Chapter 6

[adrenalineshots]

ALONE


The weight of responsibility on Sam’s shoulders is hard to bear.

Bobby’s gone. The lack of signs of a struggle inside the store only adds to Sam’s certainty that Emam is somehow involved, catching Bobby unaware.

Outside, the mess of tire tracks makes it impossible to figure out which direction they drove off. The old truck in which they arrived left nothing more than a faint oil stain on the ground and a set of wheel imprints that dissolve into the desert a couple of feet away from where it’d been parked.

The one distinct set of tracks that Sam can make out is the one he wishes was missing. But there is no ignoring the twin, thin indentations in the sand caused by the wheels of Bobby’s chair. One set going into the shop; one set coming out.

Sam leaves Dean standing by the shop’s entry and follows the parallel lines. His heart starts skipping beats when he realizes that the tracks don’t stop in the parking space. Instead, the lines go on forward, moving straight ahead until they disappear over the edge. Beyond that, there’s nothing but the quiet waters of the lake.

Racing the last few yards to the edge, Sam stops himself short of plunging in, in a desperate attempt to rescue Bobby. There is no point. Whatever events occurred there, they happened some time ago, long enough for Bobby to have drowned already.

Tears swimming in his eyes, Sam glances back at his brother, wondering how the hell he is going to tell Dean that Bobby is dead. Because of them. Just like Ellen and Jo.
For a minute there, Sam wants nothing more than to step into those dark waters and disappear himself.

He can’t though. Dean, the one who has always been there for him, the one solid rock throughout their fucked up lives, needs him.

Doesn’t make it any easier to walk back to Dean though. Sam keeps his head down, telling himself that he’s looking for some clue to who these people might be, that he’s not doing it because he can’t face Dean’s blind gaze.

It surprises Sam when his avoidance techniques actually produce something useful. He finds out that the lines of Bobby’s chair, the ones that told him that their friend was now resting at the bottom of a lake, lied.

It’s faint and the lack of proper light doesn’t help, but Sam is sure that what he’s seeing isn’t just a product of a brain that wishes more than anything to make this right and say that Bobby’s still alive. The marks, however, are impossible to misread a second time. Beyond the point where the car used to be, in the direction of the shop, the tracks are almost three times deeper than the lines that lead from the car to the edge.

Sam sighs in relief, realizing what the shallower marks mean. The chair was empty when it made its final journey to the bottom of the lake. And even though that means that Bobby is probably now in the hands of the same people that tried to capture them at the temple, at least he’s still alive.
Now it’s just a matter of finding a way out of there that doesn’t involve the back of a police van, and figuring out a way to get Bobby and Cas back.

Sam rakes a hand through his hair. What they need now is a plan.

“They took Bobby,” Sam announces as soon as he is close enough to say it quietly. It sounds infinite times better than ‘Bobby is dead’, but Dean still responds with a slump of his shoulders. “They dumped his wheelchair in the lake. Emam’s car is gone.”

“Which means you were right… He-man sold us out,” Dean concludes, his hands closing in tight fists that leave his knuckles white and taunt. If he hadn’t memorized the proper way to say the man’s name before, now he doesn’t even bother. Not when the Egyptian has just lost all of Dean’s respect. There’s few things in Dean’s book that come in lower than betraying a friend’s trust. “The man knows what is like to be possessed… why the hell would he be helping a demon?”

“I don’t know,” Sam whispers. It tastes like a lie in his lips. He knows of plenty of reasons to side with a demon. He spent more than a year listing them and using them to convince himself that he was doing the right thing by working with Ruby.

Family.

Love.

Pride.

Revenge.

Take your pick and apply like smoothing salve over burning shame. Sam knows it works and he knows that, whatever reasons Emam has, it might be too late when he finally realizes that they are the wrong ones.

“Try Bobby’s cell phone,” Sam says. “I don’t see it anywhere... maybe it’s still with him,” he offers hopefully.

The phones had been bought in a street market, just hours before. Two cell phones, cheap and disposable. One for Sam and Dean, the other for Bobby. Each with only one number programmed into it, making it easier to maintain contact between the three of them. Glorified walkie-talkies, Bobby had called them.

Sam watches as Dean uses his thumb to locate the cell phone screen and hit ‘1’ on the speed dial, bottom lip disappearing under his teeth as he bites down his anxiety.



The fact that the phone call actually connects only registers when Dean figures that he’s not imagining the ringing tone. In reality, he was half expecting to hear Bobby’s phone ringing from somewhere behind a shelf, still inside the shop or, more likely, to not ring at all, tossed into the water alongside the wheelchair.

For a fleeting moment, Dean fools himself into thinking that they are over-reacting and that Emam probably just panicked, grabbed Bobby and the two of them had run off to avoid being caught.

When the ringing tone stops Dean stops breathing. He can hear someone on the other side of the connection, puffs of air colliding with the receiver.
“Bobby?” He ventures. “Bobby, you okay?”

“Winchester,” a man answers. The single word is laden with a thick accent and a faint note of satisfaction.

It’s definitely not Bobby.

“Who are you? Where’s Bobby?”

“The man in the wheelchair is well. He will continue to be well if you and your brother do exactly as you are told.”

The urge to squeeze the cell phone in his hand until there is nothing left of it but crumbled plastic is sudden and almost uncontrollable. Only the notion that this is their only link with Bobby stops Dean’s actions. The frustration, however, finds other escape routes.
“Fuck that shit, you fucker! I wanna talk to Bobby! Right the fuck now!”

The silence on the other side stretches for long enough that Dean wonders if his outburst has cost them Bobby. He bites on his lip and feels Sam, who has been quiet as mouse so far, stepping closer to him. Sam’s ear touches the fingers of the hand Dean is using to hold the phone up and his shoulder presses against Dean’s. The warmth is more than welcome.

There is a muffled, rapid fire of Arabic words on the other side of the connection, followed by a sound that is unmistakable in any language. The crack of a breaking bone.

Dean’s stomach clenches when he hears the sharp intake of breath and recognizes the voice behind the curse that follows.
“So help me God... if you hurt him, I’ll-“ Dean hisses into the phone, the words half bitten against the anger in his tone.

In the background, Dean can still hear Bobby, swearing in Arabic now, making sure that these guys know exactly what he’s calling them and their mothers.

“The question is not ‘if I hurt him’, Winchester,” the same voice replies from the other side. “The question is how much more he hurts before you start to listen?”

“I’m listening,” Dean voices. The words taste like battery acid in his tongue.

”Good... there is a special item that I need you to find and give to me. If you do, Singer will live.”

“What ‘special item’? Who are you people?”

“Who we are is no concern to you. Your concern is only to find the Tabut Al-‘ahd. You have two days. If you fail to-“

“I have to find the what?!” Dean cuts in, too lost in the nonsense of it all to even consider the consequences to his rash actions. But all of a sudden he is finding himself in the middle of a hostage negotiation with a Middle-Eastern hostile group, being blackmailed into doing something that, for all he knows, might be drugs or weapons smuggling or some other fucked up shit... that is a whole other kind of insane that neither he nor Sam are used to dealing with. It’s bad enough that they’ve helped Lucifer walk the Earth. They don’t need to get involved with terrorists to make it end faster. “Look, pal... if this is some sort of-“

“You know it as Ark of Covenant,” the man translates. “You have forty-eight hours. Use them wisely.”

“The- Are you fucking insane? How am I supposed to know where that is? No one has ever even-“ Dean stops when he realizes that he has been talking to dead air for the last couple of seconds. “Fuck!”

“Did he just say what I think he said?” Sam asks. Dean can hear the same disbelief in his voice that he himself feels. It’s easy to imagine the puzzled look in Sam’s face too. “They can’t possibly be serious, right?”



Dean seems to have forgotten the cell phone in his hand. Sam pries it off, the plastic warm from the grip his brother was keeping on it, and looks at the screen. The blank square offers no answers other than telling him that it is four in the morning. The sun will be up in an hour or so.

“The Ark...” Dean mutters. “They actually expect us to find the Ark of Covenant, just like that, with the snap of two fingers,” Dean mutters. He is shaking his head, a look of complete astonishment on his face. “That thing doesn’t even exist!”

Sam twists his nose.
“There’s lore enough about the actual Ark to make people wonder, Dean-“

“Wonder what? Whether the Nazis stole the Ark from Indiana Jones after all? Even if it does exist, people have been looking for it for centuries, Sam... how are we suppose to find it in two days?”

Sam let out a puff of air. He heard the man on the other side of the phone too. There had been a conviction in his voice that was scary. The man seemed to firmly believe that they could do the impossible in the amount of time they’d been given.

And when the deadline ended and they still couldn’t produce the Ark, the man would probably think that they were trying to fool him, rather than thinking the more logical explanation of it simply being impossible.
Either way, Bobby will be the one paying the consequences of their actions and neither he nor Dean can accept that.

“We need figure out who these people are. Maybe even try to find a replica of the Ark...” Sam offers. “If we show up empty handed, we won’t stand a chance of rescuing Bobby.”

Sam watches as Dean palms the shelves behind him and follows them until he can feel the fresh air from outside. The white light of the bright moon hits him as soon as Dean passes through the threshold and just as fast he looks as pale as a wax figure. The blood on the side of face seems black in the silver light and Sam reminds himself that he should get something to clean that.

There is no first aid kit that he can find. However, a miniature bottle of some booze that Sam can’t read the name of reveals itself to have, amongst other things, a lovely thirty percent of alcohol. It’s enough to get the job done.

He cracks it open and dumps some on a rolled up cotton shirt that bares a drawing of a camel with the familiar catch phrase of ‘Got Milk?’ under its white coated upper lip. “Hold still,” Sam says. It’s the only warning they need between one another for something painful.

Dean barely hisses when Sam presses the booze-covered shirt over the gash in his forehead.

“He didn’t say a thing about Cas,” Dean finally whispers. “I don’t get it... we come here because Cas is captive and in danger and these people don’t even open their mouths to mention him.”

“Maybe we’re dealing with two separate groups,” Sam volunteers. He can’t see how that can even be possible. How two separate and unrelated groups with different objectives would just happen to chose the same time and place to screw them over.
Then again... several entities trying to get a piece of them all at once has been pretty much their definition of life for the past year. “Maybe,” Sam continues, “whoever has Bobby doesn’t even know Castiel exists...”

Dean is shaking his head even before Sam stops talking.
“No. It’s the same group,” he says with a certainty that tells Sam that he’s missing something.

“How can you be so sure?”

“The Ark... I hadn’t associated it before, but now,” Dean voices. His hand scratches absentmindedly at the blood congealing on the side of his face, red flakes collecting under Dean’s nails. “In the dreams I’ve been having, where Cas is... dying... the Ark is there.”

Sam walks to his brother, standing right in front of him. He can tell when Dean senses the proximity and half expects Dean’s eyes to shift up and focus on his face. Dean’s gaze, however, remains blank; staring right through him, like Sam doesn’t even exist.

“You never mentioned that part before,” Sam points out, curious.

“Well, I hadn’t thought much about it. I mean... it was just a wooden box with two angels on the lid...”

Sam has no idea why Castiel would show the Ark to his brother in a dream. He’s sure it hadn’t been inside the temple, so what was the point of leading them straight to this place when neither angel nor Ark were there?

“Well, first things first,” Sam said, a hand pushing his hair back. It falls right back to cover his eyes. “We need to find a way to get out of here. I bet the real owner of this shop will be showing up soon to open it for business, so it’s not like we can stay here much longer,” he goes on, voicing their non-options like it’s a helpful thing. “I didn’t see any cars outside that we can hotwire and walking is clearly out of the question-“

“Do you even know your way back?”

The question sounds like a challenge, until Sam realizes that his brother is posing a reasonable doubt. Dean has always been the one to know every route and path from here to nowhere in the States. Riding shotgun on their father’s multiple trips around the country through out their entire childhood had its advantages.

Sam has a good sense of direction, he knows that. He wouldn’t be much of a hunter if he didn’t. But there is no way he can retrace their way back to Emam’s town and their stuff.

They drove for hours and as far as Sam noticed, all the signs and directions had been in Arabic. Plus, he had trusted implicitly in Emam and Bobby’s direction, choosing to spend the trip worrying about his blind brother more than he had paid attention to which roads they were traveling.

“No... you’re right,” Sam confesses with a sigh. “We could wait for the morning and try our luck with one of the tourist buses, say we got lost, robbed, something...”

“You think the cops won’t be waiting for us as soon as we hit town? And when they clue in on the fact that we’re not even supposed to be on the country? Not to mention the three dead bodies we just left behind,” Dean adds with a tired sigh. “We might as well go to the guards right now and ask for a ride to prison with them.”

Sam closes his hands into fists, cracking every knuckle, one at a time. It’s an annoying sound, eerie, and something that Sam only does when he’s lost in thought and lacks a pen to play with. For a time, that’s the only sound that can be heard. The silence, in such a deserted place and with such weight pressing down on them, feels like the feet of an overweight elephant.

Dean turns away from Sam, cocking his head to the side and facing the end of the parking space. Sam’s first instinct is to look in that direction, trying to see what caught his brother’s attention. Beyond the last date tree, however, there is nothing but the desert.



The bark of a dog carries softly through the silence, a distant sound that seems to waver in and out of existence with the occasional breath of wind.

The first time Dean had heard it, he was still inside the shop, phone clenched in his palm and the man’s menacing words still ringing in his ears. He dismissed it then, thinking that perhaps it’s just the guard’s dog, barking at some desert rat.

As soon as he steps outside, though, the occasional single bark becomes more distinct and less random. A deep, growling sound that calls to attention. Dean shifts his head, the sound coming clearly from the left. He has no idea why the seemingly random dog barks grab his interest so fiercely, but Dean finds himself listening for the next bark. Maybe it’s the same dog from before, at the temple’s doorway, Mile-Oh’s look-alike.

It had to be a sign of some sort. Before, that dog had alerted him to what was happening inside the temple, making sure that Dean got there in time to help Sam. It was, more than likely, just a reaction to the sounds of struggle, that the animal would have probably heard a lot better than Dean, but the hunter in him couldn’t help but at least consider the animal’s presence as a good omen.

When the next bark fades away, it’s very faint sound of laughing voices and music that grabs Dean’s attention instead.

He searches around for Sam’s arm, knowing his brother is close enough to easily reach him. When his fingers brush against clothing, Dean grabs on tight.
“Do you hear that?” he asks Sam. There’s a big chance that this is nothing more than the guards, chatting at a distance. Or even the first of the shop owners, coming to start business.

“Hear wha-“ Sam stops and Dean’s breath freezes in his chest. Sam’s arm under his touch isn’t tense, so Dean figures his silence is a good thing.

“Desert people. Bedouins, I think,” Sam whispers. “There’s a group of them camped just on the edge of the parking lot... how did you--?”

Dean shrugs. He has no idea how far the camp is, but Sam sounds impressed. Saying that a dog told him would just sound nutty, but right now, Dean wishes that Mile-Oh is near enough to be properly thanked with a good head rub.
“We could try get a ride from them,” Dean suggests instead.

“From Bedouins? How are we even gonna ask them?” Sam asks, puzzlement written all over his tone.

“Try the puppy dog eyes thingy... that hardly needs translation.”

Sam’s silent for a while, the sarcastic response absent. When his presence is gone from his side, Dean wonders what the hell he said wrong and what Sam’s off to do.

He returns quickly though, a lighter step to his gait.
“Let’s go... I found a way to translate the puppy dog eyes thingy,” Sam says lightly, a hint of playfulness in his voice.



The group of four men, excitably talking around the fire, grows silent as soon as Sam and Dean near them.

The camels form a near circle around the men, three animals sitting on their bony legs, long eyelashes closed over sleepy eyes. Two others are up, lazily chewing on something that makes their jaws work from side to side, like old typewriters.

The clothing that this group of Bedouins wears is a study in contradictions. They all have on long tunics, much like the one Sam saw Emam wearing before, but underneath, he catches a glimpse of jeans; the fabric of the tunics seems almost home made, crude, but sturdy and warm enough to protect them from the chill of the night, but under the hem of their sleeves, Sam can see a digital watch on at least two of the men.

Their ages are hard to gauge, the youngest looking about Dean’s age and the oldest about twice that. Family members, it looks like, from the resemblances Sam can catch in the shape of their eyes and noses.

One is wearing a fez, a dark, thin wool one; the others cover their heads with simple cloths of cotton fabric intricately wrapped around their skulls. Their skin, almost brown in the faint light of the pre-dawn, looks weatherworn and rugged, like well-tanned pieces of leather.

Two colorful hookahs, with twin tubes leading out of each one like limp limbs, stand in the middle of the group, bluish smoke rising in the air every time one of the men takes a leisurely smoke out of his own hose tip. There is a sweet, fruity smell filling the air. Strawberries. Sam realizes that the pipe smoke smells of strawberries.

Four pairs of dark eyes focus on the two non-Egyptian men, patiently waiting for them to state their business.

Sam fumbles with the dictionary. On the brisk walk there - the speed somewhat hindered by his need to guide Dean carefully over the rocky ground- he'd skimmed through the initial pages, finding at least a greeting phrase. When asking for favors, it always helped to come across as at least attempting to be polite.

Before opening his mouth, Sam clears his throat, wondering how the hell is he going to pull this off. “Salam,” he offers. To his ears, it sounds too close to Salem for it to be right, but the men, at least, don’t immediately start laughing in his face. That’s a good start. Instead, they nod and one offers a raspy ‘Shallam’ back at him.

Looking furiously through the small book, Sam tries to locate the other two words that he needs to get out. The name of the nearest city. And ‘Please’.
“Aswan, mumken,” Sam struggles on, the words feeling wrong in his mouth. He just hopes that they sound right enough to get the message across to the men staring at them like they’re both insane.

The logs burning in the fire crackle and hiss and Sam repeats a heartfelt ‘please’ when the first one brings no results. The Bedouin men exchange a couple of words between them, but their faces are unreadable. Sam feels a small amount of success at the fact that they haven’t just shooed him and Dean out of their camp.

Dean is silent by his side, head cocked to the side as he too listens to the whispered conversation. They can’t understand a word of it, but the tone in which words are said is usually a good clue. And what the tone of that conversation is telling Sam and Dean is that these men don’t feel much inclined to help the two strangers, foreigners that came out of nowhere to disturb their beginning of day.

“Offer them something,” Dean whispers low enough that only Sam can hear him. “It’s not like they’re gonna fulfill your every whim and request just because you asked nicely.”

Sam has considered that, he honestly has. But they have no money on them, nothing of value. The watches on their wrists are so cheap that the men would probably get offended if Sam tried to offer them as payment and the cell phone is even crappier.

The laptop, hidden from view beneath his jacket, burns against Sam’s ribs. It’s the only thing of worth that they have, but right now, it’s too valuable to be traded off for a simple ride. Right now, it’s almost as priceless as Bobby’s and Cas’s lives.

It takes Sam a second to realize that the mood of the conversation has changed since Dean spoke. Gone are the snickers and short, angry words. A feeling of curiosity and awe has entered the discussion and Sam feels the fine hairs at the back of his neck rising up. Dean's movement has shifted the interest of the small group of men from the two Winchesters to just Dean and they are all staring at him now with a kind of strange fascination that Sam does not like one bit.

These days, when Dean draws attention to himself, no matter how innocently, things always end up going badly. It makes Sam miss the times when the only heads Dean would turn with his presence were those of women -and on a couple of embarrassing occasions, men as well- at bars. Or gas stations. Or that one time at a police station.

One of the Bedouins, the older of the small group, seems to be taking a particularly keen interest in Dean, one eye fixed unwaveringly on the older Winchester. It's evident in how his thoughtful gaze never shifts, even as he talks with the others and nods his head. The man’s interest doesn’t feel hostile in any way, but Sam can’t help but see it as intrusive. Dean’s not even aware of how closely he’s being study and that, somehow, makes it all the more wrong.

Uncomfortable with where this whole situation seems to be heading, Sam is about to throw the group a heartfelt ‘never mind’ and get his brother away from there, when the one staring at Dean, gets up and speaks.
“You... American, yes?” he asks in a heavy accented voice.

Sam nods, waiting to see where this is headed. It can be something as harmless as wanting a pack of cigarettes or as outrageous as wanting to exchange his brother for a couple of camels. By his side, Sam can see Dean turning, adjusting his stance so that he’s facing the man who spoke.

Something about the Bedouin’s tone of voice, his body language, and Sam begins to see the cigarettes possibility moving further and further away.

“The blind one...” the man says, pointing to Dean. “Family?”

Sam can feel Dean tensing by his side, finally catching on to the unusual interest he's garnered.

“The blind one,” Dean almost spells, sarcasm on every single letter, “can hear just fine and the tall one is my brother.”

Even before Dean finishes his laden sentence, Sam is already figuring their odds in a fight against the four men, in case they decide to take offense over Dean’s tone. They look fit, and Sam will have to compensate for Dean’s lack of sight but-

The man, however, is smiling rather than looking ready to kick their asses.
“Name is Azeem,” the Bedouin man says, right hand splayed over his chest. “My brothers: Hakim, Jarib and Fadil,” he goes on, eliciting a touch to the heart from each of the other men as he says their names. “Is custom for my people to give... help to who asks.”

The man sounds sincere enough, but if it wasn’t for the fact that they are in desperate need to get out of there, Sam would’ve still turned his back on the group of men. He hadn’t expected the interest that Dean had set off in the group of men. He didn’t like it one bit. The fact that they haven’t yet got around to act on it isn’t exactly a source of relief to Sam.

“We’d appreciate it,” Sam starts, words measured and carefully planned. “If you could take us as far as Aswan, I’m sure we can arrange for some sort of payment for your troub-“

Azeem’s extended finger stops Sam’s offer. “The amulet...” he points at Dean’s neck. “You find it?”

The question throws Sam completely off. Of all the things that he would expect the Egyptian man to be interested in...

Without his eyes to recognize how conspicuous his actions are, Dean grabs for the pendant hanging from his neck, hiding the golden, horned head from view.
“It was a gift... and no, you can’t have it,” Dean informs, skipping ahead a few lines to make sure that the man doesn’t ask for the amulet as payment.

The man studies the way Dean’s fingers clench protectively around the pendant, his gaze long enough and hard enough that even Dean realizes that he is being watched. He shifts uncomfortably on his feet and Sam tries to resist the urge to just step in and hide Dean from the man’s eyes altogether.

Azeem’s face finally splits into another smile that manages to take ten years from his age and a lot of points from his creep-factor. Sam’s not sure if that’s reassuring or even more disturbing.

“I would never part you from your gift. Our help... is free,” Azeem says.

Sam doesn’t know enough about desert people to know if the man is telling the truth or just luring them into some misguided sense of safety before turning on them. A ride for free certainly sounds too good to be true.
“Then why the interest?” Sam bluntly asks.

Azeem stops, the smile fading into something deeper, more serene and closer to content than joy.
“Is beautiful piece... I am honored to lay my eyes on it.”

The man is lying. Sam knows it as well as he knows his shoe size, but the fact that he’s lying tells Sam that there’s information to be gathered there. Between Bobby’s contention that the amulet is nothing more than a shiny trinket and Castiel’s opposite revelation that it is a lightning-rod for God, Sam is sure that the truth must lie somewhere in between.

“Good,” Dean voices with a smile. “When can we leave?”

To anyone looking, Dean seems at ease and happy as a clam with the events unfolding around him. Sam, however, can see how fake and forced the smile is. Dean too has caught onto the man’s deceit, but either because they have no other choice or because he too is curious, Dean seems willing to play along and see where they get to.

“Ever been on a jamal?” Azeem asks, pointing at the dozing animals nearby.

Unlike Sam, who has the visual aid of Azeem’s finger to know what he’s talking about, Dean just lets his eyebrows talk for him.

“I’ve been on a Jasmine,” Dean offers with an annoyed leer. “Does that count?”

The look of confusion on Azeem’s face gets lost, because no one is paying attention to him.

Sam leans toward Dean and says quietly, “He means the camels...” Then to Azeem and the rest he adds, “And no... can’t say that I have. Neither of us has.”

Azeem nods and gestures for them to follow him as he turns. Sam grabs Dean’s forearm, gently urging his brother along as they move over to where one of the animals is standing. At six foot and four inches, Sam is the only one who can see eye to eye with the camel. The animal’s big brown eyes focus on him without much enthusiasm and, with a bat of ridiculously long lashes, quickly dismisses him as uninteresting.

The Bedouin grabs the burled rope around the camel’s neck and pulls his head down to whisper a couple of words on the animal’s dog-like ears. The camel’s nostrils flare up once and then he graciously folds on himself until he’s kneeling on the ground, cutting his height by half.

“Trust animal. He knows desert better,” the man advises, holding the camel still and waiting for one of them to climb on.

“Any chance you have a car hidden somewhere?” Dean ventures, his hand reaching out to touch the animal’s coarse and short hair.

No such luck, though.

“Hold on tight,” Sam advises, satisfied to see Dean’s grip on the handle tighten. He’s seen the sharp movements that the camel made to change positions and can only assume it will feel like a roller coaster ride to whoever sits atop as the animal gains its feet. Knowing that his brother doesn’t have that insight, Sam grabs Dean's hand to get his attention before the animal stands. "The camel’s gonna lean really sharply backwards when he gets up and then forward when he gets down. Remember that so that you can compensate."

The advice is meant as a precaution, but it only serves to steal the color from Dean’s face and place a poorly concealed terrified glaze over his eyes.

A short rod, sticking out from the front of the blanket-covered torso of the camel, provides for the only place Dean can hold on to, and he does so with a death-grip. Dean had never held much love for alternative transportation methods. Sam’s sure that a four legged animal that Dean’s had no contact with before falls perfectly in that category.

Predictably enough, when the camel straightens out his front legs, while the rear ones are still bent, Dean, hands firmly grasped around the rod, yelps and almost topples backwards.



Dean’s ridden a horse before. Once. When he was fifteen. Before a much awaited date with Rebecca Smith, a date where he was sure he’d be losing his virginity. He didn’t though.

His father, Travis and Bobby had gotten together to hunt a group of skin walkers, in the deep forests of Montana. John thought it was a good opportunity for Dean to develop his tracking skills. And, unfortunately for Dean’s dating plans, the only way to follow their prey’s tracks had been on horseback.

He’d been sore in new and embarrassing places for days, after spending a whole week on top of a hard saddle; walking in such a funny way afterwards that he’d been too embarrassed to go on his date at all.

Now, on top of another furry animal, with nothing between Dean’s crotch and the camel’s hard, dorsal hump but a flimsy piece of wool, he isn’t having that much more fun either.

Ridding the damn tall animal feels more like trying to stay on top of a mechanical rodeo bull than anything else. The camel’s long strides make him wobble from side to side, at the rhythm of his gangly pace. For the first time since this all started, Dean’s glad he can’t see a thing, because he’s sure that a glimpse of the madly wavering horizon would be enough to get him sea sick in the middle of the frigging desert.

Mile-Oh, from the sounds of it, is following them, for some reason that completely eludes Dean. He can hear him bark every now and then and even the dog’s barks sound like sighs of pure boredom.

Maybe that’s the reason the dog’s following him; the poor animal must’ve been bored stiff with nothing but statues to keep him company; or maybe he belongs to the Bedouin’s group; hell, he might even be a very depressed seeing-eye dog, in search of a new blind owner, after his last one dumped him in the desert.

Whichever the reason, the animal offers a comforting presence, a speck of normalcy in the middle of everything else. And from the way things are going, Dean figures he’ll end up needing a guiding-dog.

It’s not like he can keep on using Sam to fill that role for the rest of his life. Even if ‘the rest of his life’ isn’t a concept that Dean wishes to spend much time wondering about.

Used to gauging distance by looking at the odometer of his car, Dean has no idea how long and how far they’ve traveled, but it feels like forever. He feels like he’s stuck in some endless loop where he never leaves the same place. It makes for a very slow passage of time and it gives him way too much free time to be alone with his thoughts.

Sam, on top of another camel a few feet from him, isn’t having that much more fun either. Dean can hear him trying to convince his camel to walk further away from the edge of the dunes, gasping in irregular intervals here and there when, Dean figures, the animal ignores Sam’s pleas and does whatever the hell it pleases.

Azeem, the only one from the group that joined them, rides his camel in peaceful silence, right beside Dean.



They stop when Azeem tells them to stop, they ride when he decides it time to go on.

The Bedouin man stays silent for most of the time, softly humming a tune every now and then, talking in his native tongue, to the camel, Dean suspects. The dry meat that he shares with the Winchester when they break for a meal tastes of sweet herbs and fireplace smoke. They drink tea, instead of water and all that Dean can dream about is a cold beer.

His skin feels like sand paper, after a whole day under the desert’s sun, and even with the long scarves that Azeem has given them both to roll up around their heads, Dean feels himself slowly turning into a dry papyrus... which is kind of fitting, he figures.

They stop for the night in the middle of nowhere. The only sound that Dean can hear is the animals, scuffing around in the sand and the wind, whistling as it circles around them.

The silence is overwhelming and Dean draws his folded knees closer to his chest. The night is chilly and, even once Azeem gets a fire going, Dean can’t seem to get warm.

He misses the sound of traffic; of rustling leaves in the trees that surround the highway, the clatter of dishes that precedes a nice meal by the side of the road. He misses normal. Their kind of normal.

By his side, burning hot as a furnace, Sam is flipping through the pages of some book. The dictionary, Dean remembers, chuckling at the thought that, by morning, Sam will have probably mastered the language.

“So, hum... Azeem,” Dean starts tentatively when the silence stretches for longer than what he can bear, clearing his throat from the dust that has gathered, “know any good jokes?”

The man is silent for a while, either trying to translate what Dean has said and failing to do so, or ignoring his pathetic need to fill in the silence.

“You know of Solomon, the king?” The Bedouin finally replies, surprising Dean, who had figured that the man was simply going to ignore his request.

“Hum... no, I don’t think I’ve heard that one before...”

“Solomon was great king of anci-“

Dean raises his hand, hopefully in the direction of the talking man. “I know who Solomon was... I thought you were going to tell a joke...”

“No joke... important story,” the man replies. His voice sounds an odd mix of offended and amused. “Listen.”

Dean absent-mindedly drops his hand to the sand and sinks his fingers into the still hot, grainy ground. “Sorry... go ahead. Guess we could use a good campfire story.”

“You know of king Solomon temple, yes? How it was built?”

“By workers?” Dean ventures, playing his part. He can tell by the way the other man asks the question that he is talking about the lore surrounding Solomon’s temple. The one that casual tourists don’t usually know about. So Dean acts like one.

There is a pause, in which Dean imagines the man watching him, studying his face, trying to determine if Dean is kidding or actually being serious.
The notion feels like tiny ants crawling through Dean’s skin and he shifts his ass on the sand, creating a more comfortable seat for himself. He can tell that this is going to take awhile.

“Shayatin,” Azeem finally says, whispering the word as if one will come if called too loudly. “Demons.”

“And how did he manage that?” Sam voices. It figures that he would be eavesdropping on their conversation even through his incessant flipping of pages.

Dean hopes that he’s managed to control the smirk on his face in time for the Bedouin man to have not noticed it. But it’s nearly impossibly to not chuckle, hearing Sam sounding so naïve and excited when talking about demons.

“Solomon very special man. Special blood ran in his veins. And he had ring. Magic ring that made king command all evil beings. So, he command ‘build me temple!’... and they did. It made him very powerful king. And when king died, sons all wanted ring.”

“Couldn’t he just a make a copy for each?” Dean asks. He knows some of the lore surrounding Solomon’s ring and the key. Both him and Sam know it, from sitting in Bobby’s library, going through his books as they searched for a way to trap demons. It seemed like a life time ago that that had happened, Meg hot on their heels, their dad taken by demons... not much had changed since then. And yet, everything was different now.

Again the silence answers him.

“Only Solomon could control ring. But sons did not believe that, they wanted power for themselves. It special ring. Gift from angel. So, Abijam and Rehobam, Solomon sons, fight for it, until king decides that there is only one solution,” Azeem tells, his words barely containing the enthusiasm he obviously feels with this particular story.

Besides the lore concerning demons, there aren’t that many stories about Solomon that Dean can recall. He remembers hearing Pastor Jim telling them about the one with the two mothers, fighting for possession of the same son, and how cleverly Solomon decided their conflict by offering to cut the kid in half. He figures it’s a nice enough guess. “Cut it in half?” Dean offers.

“Yes! You do know story,” the man yells excitedly. “Sad by sons bad behavior, Solomon ordered ring cut in two. To one son, he gives ring piece, with star. To the other, he gives golden head.”

Dean can feel every muscle in his body tense at the mention of that.

“What sort of golden head?” Sam asks. His eyes roam instantly to the pendent hanging from Dean’s neck.

“The head... is said it shows... image of angel that give ring to Solomon in first place. Tales of how talisman looks pass on from father to son since those days-“ the man stops himself and his eyes follow Sam’s gaze to land on Dean’s chest as well. “A long face with close eyes and circle above head. Like that,” he punctuates with a finger in Dean’s direction.

“And here comes the catch...” Dean lets out, not needing his eyes to know where everyone is looking at. “This is why you helped us, right? You think that this is that Solomon half-ring thing?”

The pendant is in Dean’s hand, the golden material catching the light of the fire.
“In case you haven’t noticed, this head has horns. That angel of Solomon was a horny dude, is that it?” Dean points out, pushing the amulet as far as its string goes in the direction of the Bedouin man.

“That not horns,” the man replies, the condescendence in his voice too obvious. “That is hilt of flaming sword, symbol of angel’s power and position in Heaven.”

Sam’s sigh and Dean’s eye-roll are simultaneous. There is only one angel that’s famous for his flaming sword.

“Wait... don’t tell me-“ Dean lets out.

“Mikael... left ring on Earth for purpose. Important purpose. And you wear it.”

Dean sags against the sand, suddenly feeling the weight of the past days pushing him down impossibly hard. “I asked you not to tell me...”

“You make joke?” The man asks, his tone serious and offended. “Everything around us falls apart now... and you joke about this? No joke.”

“You sound like someone I know,” Dean says with a tense smile. In fact, the Bedouin has all but said the exact same words about responsibility that Zachariah is always trying to shove down his throat. For a moment, panic builds up inside Dean’s chest. He’s lost track of where Sam is and has no idea how to tell his brother that they might be traveling with someone working for that dick of an angel. “Sam...”

The whispered name is enough, though. One second, there is nothing around Dean but empty air and doubts, the next he can feel Sam’s strong fingers wrapping around his right wrist.

“He’s not,” Sam says, sounding as certain that those are the right words as if he had read Dean’s mind. “He got a bit miffed by your tone and just scooted over to sleep... but I don’t think he’s working for Zach. I think he was just hoping that we would give more importance to his story.”

The camel ride has made the muscles at the bottom of Dean’s back ache like a mother, and he forces himself to relax while they still can. It’s embarrassing how comforting Sam’s nearness is, but he can’t allow himself to dwell on thoughts of dependence and screwed up chances now.
“You think there’s any truth to that tale?”



Sam doesn’t answer. He doesn’t sleep either. Curled next to Dean, he forces himself to not go over all that has been said and the possibilities that it raises, but his brain can’t seem to stop.

On the other side of the fire, Azeem is sound asleep, sitting comfortably with his back against one of his camels. He didn’t speak to them again, not after sharing his tale and Sam senses that they might’ve offended the man with their reaction.

But the truth is, they don’t want it to be true.

Looking up the story behind Dean's amulet was never something that had crossed Sam's mind. To him, the golden piece was and would always be a reminder of one more of dad's disappointments, at the same time that it marked the first time that he'd been able to do something for Dean instead of the other way around.

For most of his young life, Dean had been the one constant in Sam's existence. The one he could depend on, the one who, no matter what, always ended up telling him the truth. Just as it had happened that Christmas so very, very long ago.

And Sam had been able to show Dean how important he was to him by giving him that amulet.

These recent developments surrounding that particular gift all felt like a punch to Sam's stomach. One more tidbit of their lives where they'd been manipulated into playing their parts; one more piece of the big puzzle that he'd so readily put in place.
What would've happened if he'd given the amulet to John just like he’d intended to? Would it still have passed on to Dean when John died? Would they still end up in this place, having this conversation? Or would John do like he did with most of the things that they'd gotten him for birthdays and Christmas and Father's days and just stored it away or lost it? Would it still have found its way to Dean's hands, where it obviously belongs?

"I think that we know enough about Solomon and the lore surrounding him to give the story some credit," Sam continues. "I mean... who knows? The man devised a series of protections sigils to trap demons that are still the best way we know of to hold them. Someone must've told him how to do that... Michael’s just a good as bet as any other angel," Sam finally says.

The words are barely a whisper, but he knows Dean’s awake too, trying his best to look like he’s resting by his side. He shifts, doesn’t bother to open his eyes as he turns his head toward Sam.
"Yeah... I guess so," Dean says. "But I tell you one thing,” his right hand is poised over his chest as Dean’s fingers lazily trace the contours of the amulet's face, “if this was Michael's face at the time, dude was seriously fugly."

“It does raise a couple of questions though,” Sam says, voice lost in thought. “If this is one part of the ring, where the hell is other and how effective are they apart when they’re supposed to work together?”

Dean chuckles, a dry sound that surprises even himself.

“What?” Sam asks, because at the moment, he’s failing to see any funny side to the whole thing.

“I was just thinking... it’s kind of funny, you know? With all this ring crap, I’m starting to feel like Frodo over here, but you... you don’t even have to change your name, do you Samwise?”



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