No Such Thing as a Night Off (2/2)--SPN--Dean, Sam
Title: No Such Thing as a Night Off--Part 2 of 2
Author: borgmama1of5
Summary: They’d just finished a poltergeist. Dean just wanted to relax a little. So, of course, Sam had to find another case.
Spoilers: Between Bloody Mary and Skin, season 1
Wordcount: 9600--complete in 2 posts
Genre: H/C, Casefic, Gen
Disclaimer: Not mine or I’d sit them down and set them straight
Rating: PG-13 (language)
Beta: sandymg
Part One: http://borgmama1of5.livejournal.com/40975.html
Dean settled into the chair by the side of the hospital bed. As these kinds of chairs went, it wasn’t too bad, actually. It had been a long time since he’d done a bedside vigil for Sam, and damn, he’d have been okay without ever doing another one … Seeing his little brother hooked up to a monitor and an I.V. stirred up too many memories of both Sam and Dad and stomach-churning anxiety. Always wanted it to be him, not them, if someone was hurt bad enough to be in the hospital …
In … out … Dean watched Sam’s steady breaths. Just as Dean was relaxing with them, there was a hitch in the rhythm and Dean was at alert before he even realized what had triggered his adrenaline jump. He stared at Sam while holding his own breath, waiting for resumption of the even tempo. Sam hadn’t been hooked up to a heart monitor, which was reassuring in that Sam didn’t need one, but Dean wouldn’t have minded the comfort of a monotone beep-beep in the background.
Several ragged beats, then slowly Sam’s breathing returned to a smooth, albeit shallow, cadence, and Dean could resume breathing as well. The freckle-like nicks on Sam’s cheeks and chin were all daubed with a shiny anti-biotic gel.
Dean’s eyes locked on the brown crust of blood stiffening Sam’s hair and hated that he could think of too many other times he’d cleaned his brother up. Not three months back together and Sam’d been hurt twice now, first that damn Bloody Mary thing and now this. If Dean had followed his brains instead of his dick, if he’d taken that stupid pamphlet seriously, if he’d taken Sam seriously …
“D’n?”
“Right here, Sammy.” Dean was up and in his brother’s line of sight without thinking.
“Don’ feel too good …” Sam trailed off, his eyes flickered closed, then he forced them open. Dean could tell they weren’t focusing on him.
“ ’S got a spirit under control … more’n one, but I think only one’s dan’g’rous … ’s in the attic, got a finger bone … ’n salt ’n iron …”
“ ’S okay, Sammy, I’ll take care of it.”
Sam lifted one hand in random motions and creased his face in agitation. “No, Dean, gotta help you, don’ do it alone!”
Crap. Not the first time Dean’d associated the image of a dog gnawing on a bone with Sam and a case.
“Yeah, okay, Sam, but you gotta get outa here first.” Dean gently settled the still waving hand back on the covers. “We’ll take care of it tomorrow. Just rest now.”
Next day, as carefully as he could, Dean helped his brother transfer from the hospital wheelchair to the Impala’s passenger seat. Sam hissed repeatedly despite Dean’s gentleness and it was impossible not to wince along with him.
“Sam?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.”
Bullshit … But there was no point in calling Sam on it right now.
Dean hated that all he could do was to make Sam take his pain meds and prop pillows around him on the motel bed to cushion his ribs and back. He watched as Sam closed his eyes, and with careful, shallow breaths, settled down. Dean was hoping Sam would fall asleep, but of course no such luck. Sam opened his eyes and frowned.
“So what are we gonna do about this ghost?”
“We aren’t doing anything, Sammy.” Dean put his hand up to forestall the bitchface. “You aren’t in any kind of shape for anything. So we’ll figure what it is and how to get rid of it and then I’ll take care of it. You aren’t leaving this room.”
“Screw you.”
“Yeah, I know.” He hated the pinched look as Sam tried to wriggle into a less painful position.” So tell me what we’ve got, Sam.”
***
His head throbbed and his back ached.
Oh, come on, Sam, he thought, you can do better than that. ‘Little men with pneumatic hammers were at work inside his skull.’ Trite, but properly descriptive …
He wanted to curl up into a ball. Just tightening his muscles to get ready to shift positions made it clear he wasn’t moving.
Where was Dean? Oh yeah, he’d gone off to track down where Ralphie was buried.
He needed to pee. He groaned. The bathroom door was across from the foot of his bed and it might as well have been on the moon.
Okay, it was either get up or wet the bed. And he hadn’t wet the bed since he was four and he wasn’t going to resume that … so sit up. Yeah, right.
Push up on elbows. Shit. Rest of the way to sitting up. Shit. Breathe without moving his ribs. Not possible. Shit. Don’t lay back down. Bladder about to explode. Shit. Legs to the side. Shit.
To the accompaniment of his internal dialog laced with profanity, Sam managed to attain a wavery upright position and shuffle with excruciating care to the toilet. Then was the five hundred mile trip back to his bed. He had just made it back to sitting on the edge of the mattress when the motel door opened.
“What’re you doing, Sam?”
“Just had to take a leak.” Sam wished his voice hadn’t come out so ragged. Dean obviously thought Sam was just starting the process from the way he leaned in to help Sam up.
“I’m done. Trying to lay down again.”
“Shit, I’m sorry I wasn’t here.” Dean eased him back down, taking Sam’s weight to minimize the use of his battered ribs and back. “Did you piss any blood?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Good.” All the pain he was in, and yet it felt weirdly nice to have Dean hovering over him … He’d been sick a few times in school and Jess had, well, mothered him, but it wasn’t that different from her usual manner of lovingly watching out for him. While he and Dean had perfected the obnoxious brother routine, and though Sam knew there was affection underlying it, seeing a moment when Dean wasn’t hiding his concern felt … good.
Or maybe it was just that it had been four years since Sam had given his brother a chance to take care of him a little. Or the pain meds.
“Thanks.”
Dean looked honestly puzzled. “Huh?”
“For taking care of me.”
Dean frowned. “Jesus, Sam, it’s not like I’m doing anything you or Dad haven’t done for me. ’Sides, it’s my fault you got hurt in the first place.”
Now it was Sam’s turn to frown. “How the hell is it your fault that I got slammed by a ghost?”
“I shoulda been there.”
“There was no way to know it was a real ghost or that it was gonna turn bad - Clancy’d been doing this for a while without any problems. Besides, I was pretty convinced it was a hoax until we got to the attic.”
Dean sat down on his own bed, looked away from Sam’s face. “You thought it was something worth checking out. I shoulda had your back. My fault.”
“Dean …”
“Not gonna discuss it. You want something to drink? More pain pills? Are you hungry yet?”
Sam started to inhale for a deep sigh of exasperation and quickly thought better of it. He settled for a shallow grunt to show Dean he didn’t agree at all, then realized he was pretty thirsty and decided a glass of water would be good.
Dean had refused to talk about the case until Sam had eaten, but now, with Chinese takeout boxes scattered around the room Sam pushed to hear what Dean had learned.
“So Ralph DePrizio was a bouncer for the brothel and a member of Capone’s gang.” At Sam’s raised brow Dean added with quirked lips, “Yeah, that Capone. Al Capone actually owned the property for about fifteen years.”
“So what Clancy said about juice loans and bodies in the concrete floor might be true. Huh.”
“Yeah, well the story in the brochure about Ralph murdering Estelle Reed, who ran the place, and her two kids, is apparently true. Been a few stories about her being seen in the rooms on the second floor, but nothing about Ralph until recently.”
“Define recently.”
“When this Clancy dude showed up. He’s been a low-level ‘paranormal explorer’ in northern Illinois for about twenty years, but I didn’t find anything to show he actually did anything until he showed up at the Boar’s Tail and offered to make the owner more money by showing ghosts on the property. Owner guessed it was a come-on but figured there was nothing to lose - any PR is good PR - and he never actually took the tour. Just the money of the ‘satisfied customers.’ Of whom he was getting a lot of lately. He was paying Clancy a bonus every time someone booked a dinner reservation specifically to take the ghost tour.”
Absorbed in Dean’s story, Sam shifted without thinking, then groaned.
“Hey, Sammy, take it easy.”
“It’s Sam. Yeah, go on.”
“So I’ve located the cemeteries with the four bodies - Estelle and her kids are in the same one - and figure once I find whatever Clancy had in the brothel linking the ghosts to him, it’ll just be a routine salt ‘n’ burn.”
“Dean, you didn’t see how pissed Ralphie’s ghost was! He is not a spirit you’re taking out on your own!”
“Actually, dude, from your condition I do get the idea that this Ralph is not going to be a picnic. But there aren’t a lot of options here. And it’s not like I’ve never done this alone before, for Pete’s sake. I did a lot of stuff on my own while you were in school!”
Why did his brother have to be the most stubborn person on the face of the planet? Immediately his conscience objected, reminding him it was more likely a three-way tie. Sam ignored the thought, he wanted to be pissed with Dean.
“How ’bout a compromise? You find the stuff Clancy was using in the Boar’s Tail tonight, take care of Estelle and her kids tomorrow night, and by then I’ll be able to help with Ralphie the night after that.”
“Sam …” Dean looked at his brother’s uncompromising face. “Yeah, maybe, we’ll start it that way, anyway.”
***
The inn was still sealed off with police tape, so entering in the back was easy. Dean had kept an ear open for what the cops were doing with the case while he’d been checking records all afternoon, and he knew they were baffled but inclined to say that the psychic had gone psycho, except for the fact that left the psycho psychic with an unexplainable broken neck … but Dean’d seen weirder shit covered up by the authorities so he was confident the truth would be totally scrambled within a few weeks. And he’d shuffled Sam out of the hospital before the police had ever gotten to have a coherent conversation with him.
So they’d finish this up, leave the state, and find someplace to rest for a few weeks to give Sam a chance to heal properly.
Dean quickly found the sitting room from Sam’s directions, and located the disturbed patch behind the boar’s ear without any problem, other than having to feel for it blindly, given that his gigantor brother was eye-to-eye with the thing and Dean wasn’t. He opened the little pouch, cautiously spilling its contents into his hand.
Salt. And two small bones.
Someone was behind him.
He’d laid the sawed-off on the mantel while searching the boar’s head. Now he picked it up and whirled.
Two child-sized figures, clutching each other, winking in and out in the shadowed light from the flashlight propped to illuminate the trophy head.
They made no move toward him, just stared. Serious faces, enormous eyes, the slightly taller one’s arms tightly clutching the smaller one’s shoulders, the smaller girl squeezing her big sister’s waist.
Hand-sized bruises around their necks. Shit.
“I’m not gonna hurt you, okay?” He was reassuring a ghost? “I’m gonna find your mom and then you can all be together, and … go home or something.”
No reaction, just that unblinking stare.
“So I’m looking for your momma’s … part.”
The bigger girl took one hand off her sister long enough to point to a drawer in the giant sideboard. Well, that’s where Sam had figured … Dean opened it and then tried to interpret what the flashlight showed.
There were the four dowsing rods along one side, and another small pouch, but at the back of the drawer a two-inch diameter circle of salt was glued down. He felt in the pouch with a finger, not dumping this one in his palm. Definitely another bone mixed with salt. Dean was starting to get a picture of how Clancy controlled his collection of spirits. Made sense, even if he’d never heard of it being done before. But then, hunters got rid of the ghosts, didn’t tame them.
And in the end, Ralph hadn’t really been tamed.
He turned back to the spirits of the little girls. “I’m gonna have to put you … back … wherever it is you go when your bones are in the salt, but I promise I’ll put you with your mom and let the three of you … go. Okay?”
They just stared and Dean felt a little stupid and a little disappointed and a little, well, he didn’t know what. Only that if Clancy wasn’t dead Dean would have beat the shit out of him for sure. Whatever. He slid the tiny fragments back in the bag and put it, along with the one from the drawer, into his inner coat pocket.
Now for Ralph. And Sam was worried that the police might have taken that bone as part of the evidence. Dean really hoped Sam was wrong, that suburban cops wouldn’t have been that thorough. ‘Cause if he couldn’t find it in the attic, getting rid of Ralph was going to get a lot harder.
Jesus, a tornado had gone through the attic. Sam had said it was pretty intense, but the actual mess was a lot more graphic than Sam’s description. And Sam hadn’t actually seen the aftermath, he’d been out cold on the floor in the salt circle.
Every step crunched in the shards of … glass, pottery, wood … other than a couple pieces of furniture right against the eaves and some unbreakable metal items like a fan and a sewing machine, everything in the attic was reduced to unidentifiable slivers. Dean had encountered some pretty angry spirits, but this was one of the worst.
As he neared the far end of the space Dean started to scuff the debris aside to locate the circle. Once he had found the outside edge, Dean walked the entire perimeter, clearing a small trail with his steps. Back at the starting point, he oriented himself to where Sam would have been standing. Looked back at the stairwell where Ralph had first appeared, then into the circle. There was the iron candelabra, so Sam must have been about there …
And now Dean saw what must have taken his brother out - a fucking dining room table was in the circle just beyond the candleholder. All four legs were broken off and Dean could tell that this was a solid wooden antique that would have killed Sam if it had hit him in the head. Dean paused for a necessary deep breath. Sam was okay. Do the job and get out.
Only way to find something as small as a finger bone in this disaster was to get down and sift through the rubble. He began to quarter the circle with the military precision he’d been trained in, knowing that if he didn’t find it in this area he would have to go through the entire attic.
He wasn’t completely sure how long he’d been at it when the atmosphere around him changed. Knowing immediately what this meant, he didn’t even bother standing, just pulled out the shotgun and turned.
Ralph’s ghost, face hatefully twisted, flashed from the stairs to mid-attic to the outside edge of the salt.
Dean fired.
This was going to get tricky, fast. He’d checked close to half the circle but barely siifted another six-inch area when Ralph reappeared. Damn.
Dean blew Ralph away twice more before the ghost went to plan B and started hurling stuff at Dean from across the room. Didn’t matter that the pieces slamming into him were tiny, the force with which their sharp edges hit his body hurt like hell. His jacket was going to be shredded, not to mention his skin … And now that Ralph was operating from a distance, Dean had to stand and leave the circle to take his shot.
He fought through the maelstrom until he was close enough for his shot to take Ralph out. Immediately all the debris dropped to the floor. Sonuvabitch, the whole section Dean had just checked was covered with a fresh layer of rubbish. He wiped his stinging face and his hand came away bloody. All he needed was to take a fragment in the eye … Dean considered calling a retreat and torching the graveyard remains first, but that wouldn’t really solve the problem. As long as a piece of Ralph remained he could continue to haunt the attic and keep Dean from finding the bone.
Senses alert, he walked back toward the circle, started to turn as he felt Ralph manifest again, but even as Dean was reacting the old sewing machine smashed Dean’s arm and knocked the gun from his hand. As he hit the floor Dean knew he was in trouble, he definitely had a dislocated shoulder. Sonuvabitch, sonuvabitch, sonuvabitch, he cussed through the pain.
He lay still for a moment. Sharp gravel-like bits were digging into his skin and his weapon was several feet away. There was no way to do this without back-up.
What if he had some and didn’t know it? It was crazy, but this whole scenario was out of kilter, so maybe … Dean eased sideways so his good hand could reach in his jacket and pull out the two pouches he’d taken from the sitting room. The mother’s’ pouch was darker … he opened the drawstring and dumped the bone from Estelle Reed on the floor.
Translucent feet in brocade slippers, slender ankles … From the floor Dean did not have a clear look, just an impression of … authority? He better make sure she understood they were on the same side.
“I’ve got your daughters, I can set all of you free from this place. But I have to find Ralph’s bone and he’s trying to kill me. Can you hold him off while I look?”
A gust of wind propelled a solid wall of pieces in Dean’s direction, Ralph completely concealed behind it. Dean must have connected with Estelle, because she held up her hands, palms flat toward the explosion heading at them, and its forward movement stopped.
That was good. Now how long could she hold it? Locating that bone with his arm like this …
“The … children … will … help.”
In the thick of battle was no time for second-guessing. Dad’s lesson: decide and follow-through. Adapt as the situation changes but don’t worry about what’s already done.
Dean poured the second bag out next to the first.
The little girls materialized locked together, then jumped to their mother’s side and transferred their grips to her. Estelle kept her hands up against the cyclone but looked down and obviously communicated to her children, for they blinked back in front of Dean, but didn’t look at him. They were staring at the attic floor.
Blink to a few steps away. Again. And then they were pointing, two little hands simultaneously flashing out, index fingers pointing together.
It was hell on his hand and knees to crawl over the jagged particles but Dean wasn’t going to try getting up. He went to where the fingers were insistently indicating. His own body blocked the distant illumination from his flashlight still on the floor, so he sat back on his heels and carefully felt with his good hand. Patted the area in a precise pattern, feeling for anything different than all the little broken bits.
He couldn’t have said how he knew, but he did when he touched a piece of bone as opposed to a pottery fragment. Dean brought it up to his eyes, and yes, it was a finger bone. Pinky, maybe. Didn’t matter. He had it. Now to get out in one piece.
He backed up to where he’d left the pouches, scooped some salt back into each one. He put Ralph’s bone in one and the wall of debris fell to the floor. Instantly Estelle’s spirit was focused on Dean.
“Got him in the bag. Gonna put your girls in the other one. We get downstairs and I put you with your daughters, then I gotta torch Ralph, then I can send you three … home.” Or wherever it is they go once Dean burned ’em.
She hadn’t especially communicated agreement with his plan earlier, but Dean took her non-reaction as a yes and proceeded to secure the children, get his shotgun, and make it down the stairs. Handrail being on the left did him absolutely no good so Dean was very careful feeling his way down. He paused to put Estelle’s bone away, and then it was out to the car and back to the motel.
Sam managed, despite his ribs, to pop Dean’s shoulder back into place and Dean figured it hurt equally bad for both of them. And he figured that gave Sam the right to bitch at him. Truthfully it hurt too much to argue back.
“Dammit, Dean, you coulda been killed!”
“Yeah.”
“That’s all you’re going to say? Yeah?”
“Ralphie had me in a pretty bad bind.”
Sam stopped. When realized Dean wasn’t going to fight back, Sam immediately switched tactics.
“Your face is a mess. Hands, too. And there’s blood on the knees of your jeans. Can you make it to the bathroom so I can clean you up?”
“I’m fine, Sam, shoulder’ll stop hurting in a bit. I can clean myself up!”
“I should …”
“You should lay back down in bed, okay? I’m gonna take a hot shower, it’ll help the shoulder and get the blood off at the same time. Efficient, you know?”
That earned him the best bitchface since this whole mess started, and for some reason that just made Dean feel better.
They actually waited a couple days so that Dean could use his shoulder to dig. Sam insisted on going with, and Dean didn’t have a problem with that since Sam was going as back-up to Dean’s back-up ghost. They were going to get rid of Ralphie first, and Estelle would be point guard during that, since her ghost powers had proven a lot more effective than the sawed-off.
Neither of them was surprised to see the grave had already been disturbed, the dirt returned haphazardly. From Clancy, no doubt.
“Should be a little easier to dig through,” Sam offered.
“Yeah. Too bad the little shit’s dead, I would’ve liked to talk to him,” Dean muttered.
“Actually I would have liked to learn what else he was doing, because something kept the wind out of the salt circle, at least until the candles went out. He had something there, could be useful for hunters, you know.”
Busy with the shovel, Dean only grunted.
“Must have been the candles, something unique about them.” Sam looked at Estelle’s ghost standing alert on the far side of Ralph’s headstone. “Wonder if she knows.”
“Go ahead and ask her. But she ain’t too talkative.”
“I …”
Sam was cut off by the furious shaking of the bare tree branches. Pieces of branches snapped off and rained down on both of them.
Estelle promptly pivoted and held up her arms to stop everything. In the bigger space, however, Ralph had the advantage of moving from tree to tree. Sam was ready to fire the shotgun but Ralph wasn’t visible yet.
“Hurry up, Dean!”
“Almost there!”
Shovel hit wood. Several more rapid scoops to the casket. Pried it open, threw in the pouch with Ralph’s bone on top of his skeleton.
“Sam! The lighter fluid!
The toss wasn’t up to Sam’s usual smooth standards but Dean caught it nonetheless and emptied it on Ralph’s remains. Suddenly the shotgun fired.
“He’s past Estelle!” Sam yelled.
The wind sounded like a rushing freight train, and Dean knew from experience that was bad. He jumped out of the hole, hit the dirt, and flung his lit cigarette lighter in the casket.
Another shotgun blast, “Dean!” then stillness. In the abrupt silence Dean was pretty sure Sam could hear Dean’s heartbeat.
Crap, where was Sam?
“Sam?”
“Ov’r here.”
The bastard had thrown Sam into one of the marble statues and Sam was slumped on the ground against it, still clutching the shotgun.
“How bad, Sammy?”
“Been better. Hit my other side. Which I guess is good …”
Dean carefully helped him up. “We can do Estelle tomorrow. We’re done for tonight.”
***
It was over.
This was as comfortable as he was going to get for a while, Sam knew. The passenger seat of the Impala was never designed to be the recovery spot for busted bodies, even though every Winchester male had used it for that. Couple of hunters who weren’t related has used it too, come to think of it. Dean had lifted a couple pillows from the motel to try and pad the seat for him.
Sometimes the driver was just as banged up as the passenger … luckily not this time. But even if he was, he’d still drive.
Because that’s what Dean did. But maybe Dean would get used to Sam being his partner now, as well as his brother. And Sam would get the chance to take care of Dean a little. Because the one guarantee Sam could see in the future was that this wasn’t the last time they were going to get hurt.
Author: borgmama1of5
Summary: They’d just finished a poltergeist. Dean just wanted to relax a little. So, of course, Sam had to find another case.
Spoilers: Between Bloody Mary and Skin, season 1
Wordcount: 9600--complete in 2 posts
Genre: H/C, Casefic, Gen
Disclaimer: Not mine or I’d sit them down and set them straight
Rating: PG-13 (language)
Beta: sandymg
Part One: http://borgmama1of5.livejournal.com/40975.html
Dean settled into the chair by the side of the hospital bed. As these kinds of chairs went, it wasn’t too bad, actually. It had been a long time since he’d done a bedside vigil for Sam, and damn, he’d have been okay without ever doing another one … Seeing his little brother hooked up to a monitor and an I.V. stirred up too many memories of both Sam and Dad and stomach-churning anxiety. Always wanted it to be him, not them, if someone was hurt bad enough to be in the hospital …
In … out … Dean watched Sam’s steady breaths. Just as Dean was relaxing with them, there was a hitch in the rhythm and Dean was at alert before he even realized what had triggered his adrenaline jump. He stared at Sam while holding his own breath, waiting for resumption of the even tempo. Sam hadn’t been hooked up to a heart monitor, which was reassuring in that Sam didn’t need one, but Dean wouldn’t have minded the comfort of a monotone beep-beep in the background.
Several ragged beats, then slowly Sam’s breathing returned to a smooth, albeit shallow, cadence, and Dean could resume breathing as well. The freckle-like nicks on Sam’s cheeks and chin were all daubed with a shiny anti-biotic gel.
Dean’s eyes locked on the brown crust of blood stiffening Sam’s hair and hated that he could think of too many other times he’d cleaned his brother up. Not three months back together and Sam’d been hurt twice now, first that damn Bloody Mary thing and now this. If Dean had followed his brains instead of his dick, if he’d taken that stupid pamphlet seriously, if he’d taken Sam seriously …
“D’n?”
“Right here, Sammy.” Dean was up and in his brother’s line of sight without thinking.
“Don’ feel too good …” Sam trailed off, his eyes flickered closed, then he forced them open. Dean could tell they weren’t focusing on him.
“ ’S got a spirit under control … more’n one, but I think only one’s dan’g’rous … ’s in the attic, got a finger bone … ’n salt ’n iron …”
“ ’S okay, Sammy, I’ll take care of it.”
Sam lifted one hand in random motions and creased his face in agitation. “No, Dean, gotta help you, don’ do it alone!”
Crap. Not the first time Dean’d associated the image of a dog gnawing on a bone with Sam and a case.
“Yeah, okay, Sam, but you gotta get outa here first.” Dean gently settled the still waving hand back on the covers. “We’ll take care of it tomorrow. Just rest now.”
Next day, as carefully as he could, Dean helped his brother transfer from the hospital wheelchair to the Impala’s passenger seat. Sam hissed repeatedly despite Dean’s gentleness and it was impossible not to wince along with him.
“Sam?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.”
Bullshit … But there was no point in calling Sam on it right now.
Dean hated that all he could do was to make Sam take his pain meds and prop pillows around him on the motel bed to cushion his ribs and back. He watched as Sam closed his eyes, and with careful, shallow breaths, settled down. Dean was hoping Sam would fall asleep, but of course no such luck. Sam opened his eyes and frowned.
“So what are we gonna do about this ghost?”
“We aren’t doing anything, Sammy.” Dean put his hand up to forestall the bitchface. “You aren’t in any kind of shape for anything. So we’ll figure what it is and how to get rid of it and then I’ll take care of it. You aren’t leaving this room.”
“Screw you.”
“Yeah, I know.” He hated the pinched look as Sam tried to wriggle into a less painful position.” So tell me what we’ve got, Sam.”
***
His head throbbed and his back ached.
Oh, come on, Sam, he thought, you can do better than that. ‘Little men with pneumatic hammers were at work inside his skull.’ Trite, but properly descriptive …
He wanted to curl up into a ball. Just tightening his muscles to get ready to shift positions made it clear he wasn’t moving.
Where was Dean? Oh yeah, he’d gone off to track down where Ralphie was buried.
He needed to pee. He groaned. The bathroom door was across from the foot of his bed and it might as well have been on the moon.
Okay, it was either get up or wet the bed. And he hadn’t wet the bed since he was four and he wasn’t going to resume that … so sit up. Yeah, right.
Push up on elbows. Shit. Rest of the way to sitting up. Shit. Breathe without moving his ribs. Not possible. Shit. Don’t lay back down. Bladder about to explode. Shit. Legs to the side. Shit.
To the accompaniment of his internal dialog laced with profanity, Sam managed to attain a wavery upright position and shuffle with excruciating care to the toilet. Then was the five hundred mile trip back to his bed. He had just made it back to sitting on the edge of the mattress when the motel door opened.
“What’re you doing, Sam?”
“Just had to take a leak.” Sam wished his voice hadn’t come out so ragged. Dean obviously thought Sam was just starting the process from the way he leaned in to help Sam up.
“I’m done. Trying to lay down again.”
“Shit, I’m sorry I wasn’t here.” Dean eased him back down, taking Sam’s weight to minimize the use of his battered ribs and back. “Did you piss any blood?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Good.” All the pain he was in, and yet it felt weirdly nice to have Dean hovering over him … He’d been sick a few times in school and Jess had, well, mothered him, but it wasn’t that different from her usual manner of lovingly watching out for him. While he and Dean had perfected the obnoxious brother routine, and though Sam knew there was affection underlying it, seeing a moment when Dean wasn’t hiding his concern felt … good.
Or maybe it was just that it had been four years since Sam had given his brother a chance to take care of him a little. Or the pain meds.
“Thanks.”
Dean looked honestly puzzled. “Huh?”
“For taking care of me.”
Dean frowned. “Jesus, Sam, it’s not like I’m doing anything you or Dad haven’t done for me. ’Sides, it’s my fault you got hurt in the first place.”
Now it was Sam’s turn to frown. “How the hell is it your fault that I got slammed by a ghost?”
“I shoulda been there.”
“There was no way to know it was a real ghost or that it was gonna turn bad - Clancy’d been doing this for a while without any problems. Besides, I was pretty convinced it was a hoax until we got to the attic.”
Dean sat down on his own bed, looked away from Sam’s face. “You thought it was something worth checking out. I shoulda had your back. My fault.”
“Dean …”
“Not gonna discuss it. You want something to drink? More pain pills? Are you hungry yet?”
Sam started to inhale for a deep sigh of exasperation and quickly thought better of it. He settled for a shallow grunt to show Dean he didn’t agree at all, then realized he was pretty thirsty and decided a glass of water would be good.
Dean had refused to talk about the case until Sam had eaten, but now, with Chinese takeout boxes scattered around the room Sam pushed to hear what Dean had learned.
“So Ralph DePrizio was a bouncer for the brothel and a member of Capone’s gang.” At Sam’s raised brow Dean added with quirked lips, “Yeah, that Capone. Al Capone actually owned the property for about fifteen years.”
“So what Clancy said about juice loans and bodies in the concrete floor might be true. Huh.”
“Yeah, well the story in the brochure about Ralph murdering Estelle Reed, who ran the place, and her two kids, is apparently true. Been a few stories about her being seen in the rooms on the second floor, but nothing about Ralph until recently.”
“Define recently.”
“When this Clancy dude showed up. He’s been a low-level ‘paranormal explorer’ in northern Illinois for about twenty years, but I didn’t find anything to show he actually did anything until he showed up at the Boar’s Tail and offered to make the owner more money by showing ghosts on the property. Owner guessed it was a come-on but figured there was nothing to lose - any PR is good PR - and he never actually took the tour. Just the money of the ‘satisfied customers.’ Of whom he was getting a lot of lately. He was paying Clancy a bonus every time someone booked a dinner reservation specifically to take the ghost tour.”
Absorbed in Dean’s story, Sam shifted without thinking, then groaned.
“Hey, Sammy, take it easy.”
“It’s Sam. Yeah, go on.”
“So I’ve located the cemeteries with the four bodies - Estelle and her kids are in the same one - and figure once I find whatever Clancy had in the brothel linking the ghosts to him, it’ll just be a routine salt ‘n’ burn.”
“Dean, you didn’t see how pissed Ralphie’s ghost was! He is not a spirit you’re taking out on your own!”
“Actually, dude, from your condition I do get the idea that this Ralph is not going to be a picnic. But there aren’t a lot of options here. And it’s not like I’ve never done this alone before, for Pete’s sake. I did a lot of stuff on my own while you were in school!”
Why did his brother have to be the most stubborn person on the face of the planet? Immediately his conscience objected, reminding him it was more likely a three-way tie. Sam ignored the thought, he wanted to be pissed with Dean.
“How ’bout a compromise? You find the stuff Clancy was using in the Boar’s Tail tonight, take care of Estelle and her kids tomorrow night, and by then I’ll be able to help with Ralphie the night after that.”
“Sam …” Dean looked at his brother’s uncompromising face. “Yeah, maybe, we’ll start it that way, anyway.”
***
The inn was still sealed off with police tape, so entering in the back was easy. Dean had kept an ear open for what the cops were doing with the case while he’d been checking records all afternoon, and he knew they were baffled but inclined to say that the psychic had gone psycho, except for the fact that left the psycho psychic with an unexplainable broken neck … but Dean’d seen weirder shit covered up by the authorities so he was confident the truth would be totally scrambled within a few weeks. And he’d shuffled Sam out of the hospital before the police had ever gotten to have a coherent conversation with him.
So they’d finish this up, leave the state, and find someplace to rest for a few weeks to give Sam a chance to heal properly.
Dean quickly found the sitting room from Sam’s directions, and located the disturbed patch behind the boar’s ear without any problem, other than having to feel for it blindly, given that his gigantor brother was eye-to-eye with the thing and Dean wasn’t. He opened the little pouch, cautiously spilling its contents into his hand.
Salt. And two small bones.
Someone was behind him.
He’d laid the sawed-off on the mantel while searching the boar’s head. Now he picked it up and whirled.
Two child-sized figures, clutching each other, winking in and out in the shadowed light from the flashlight propped to illuminate the trophy head.
They made no move toward him, just stared. Serious faces, enormous eyes, the slightly taller one’s arms tightly clutching the smaller one’s shoulders, the smaller girl squeezing her big sister’s waist.
Hand-sized bruises around their necks. Shit.
“I’m not gonna hurt you, okay?” He was reassuring a ghost? “I’m gonna find your mom and then you can all be together, and … go home or something.”
No reaction, just that unblinking stare.
“So I’m looking for your momma’s … part.”
The bigger girl took one hand off her sister long enough to point to a drawer in the giant sideboard. Well, that’s where Sam had figured … Dean opened it and then tried to interpret what the flashlight showed.
There were the four dowsing rods along one side, and another small pouch, but at the back of the drawer a two-inch diameter circle of salt was glued down. He felt in the pouch with a finger, not dumping this one in his palm. Definitely another bone mixed with salt. Dean was starting to get a picture of how Clancy controlled his collection of spirits. Made sense, even if he’d never heard of it being done before. But then, hunters got rid of the ghosts, didn’t tame them.
And in the end, Ralph hadn’t really been tamed.
He turned back to the spirits of the little girls. “I’m gonna have to put you … back … wherever it is you go when your bones are in the salt, but I promise I’ll put you with your mom and let the three of you … go. Okay?”
They just stared and Dean felt a little stupid and a little disappointed and a little, well, he didn’t know what. Only that if Clancy wasn’t dead Dean would have beat the shit out of him for sure. Whatever. He slid the tiny fragments back in the bag and put it, along with the one from the drawer, into his inner coat pocket.
Now for Ralph. And Sam was worried that the police might have taken that bone as part of the evidence. Dean really hoped Sam was wrong, that suburban cops wouldn’t have been that thorough. ‘Cause if he couldn’t find it in the attic, getting rid of Ralph was going to get a lot harder.
Jesus, a tornado had gone through the attic. Sam had said it was pretty intense, but the actual mess was a lot more graphic than Sam’s description. And Sam hadn’t actually seen the aftermath, he’d been out cold on the floor in the salt circle.
Every step crunched in the shards of … glass, pottery, wood … other than a couple pieces of furniture right against the eaves and some unbreakable metal items like a fan and a sewing machine, everything in the attic was reduced to unidentifiable slivers. Dean had encountered some pretty angry spirits, but this was one of the worst.
As he neared the far end of the space Dean started to scuff the debris aside to locate the circle. Once he had found the outside edge, Dean walked the entire perimeter, clearing a small trail with his steps. Back at the starting point, he oriented himself to where Sam would have been standing. Looked back at the stairwell where Ralph had first appeared, then into the circle. There was the iron candelabra, so Sam must have been about there …
And now Dean saw what must have taken his brother out - a fucking dining room table was in the circle just beyond the candleholder. All four legs were broken off and Dean could tell that this was a solid wooden antique that would have killed Sam if it had hit him in the head. Dean paused for a necessary deep breath. Sam was okay. Do the job and get out.
Only way to find something as small as a finger bone in this disaster was to get down and sift through the rubble. He began to quarter the circle with the military precision he’d been trained in, knowing that if he didn’t find it in this area he would have to go through the entire attic.
He wasn’t completely sure how long he’d been at it when the atmosphere around him changed. Knowing immediately what this meant, he didn’t even bother standing, just pulled out the shotgun and turned.
Ralph’s ghost, face hatefully twisted, flashed from the stairs to mid-attic to the outside edge of the salt.
Dean fired.
This was going to get tricky, fast. He’d checked close to half the circle but barely siifted another six-inch area when Ralph reappeared. Damn.
Dean blew Ralph away twice more before the ghost went to plan B and started hurling stuff at Dean from across the room. Didn’t matter that the pieces slamming into him were tiny, the force with which their sharp edges hit his body hurt like hell. His jacket was going to be shredded, not to mention his skin … And now that Ralph was operating from a distance, Dean had to stand and leave the circle to take his shot.
He fought through the maelstrom until he was close enough for his shot to take Ralph out. Immediately all the debris dropped to the floor. Sonuvabitch, the whole section Dean had just checked was covered with a fresh layer of rubbish. He wiped his stinging face and his hand came away bloody. All he needed was to take a fragment in the eye … Dean considered calling a retreat and torching the graveyard remains first, but that wouldn’t really solve the problem. As long as a piece of Ralph remained he could continue to haunt the attic and keep Dean from finding the bone.
Senses alert, he walked back toward the circle, started to turn as he felt Ralph manifest again, but even as Dean was reacting the old sewing machine smashed Dean’s arm and knocked the gun from his hand. As he hit the floor Dean knew he was in trouble, he definitely had a dislocated shoulder. Sonuvabitch, sonuvabitch, sonuvabitch, he cussed through the pain.
He lay still for a moment. Sharp gravel-like bits were digging into his skin and his weapon was several feet away. There was no way to do this without back-up.
What if he had some and didn’t know it? It was crazy, but this whole scenario was out of kilter, so maybe … Dean eased sideways so his good hand could reach in his jacket and pull out the two pouches he’d taken from the sitting room. The mother’s’ pouch was darker … he opened the drawstring and dumped the bone from Estelle Reed on the floor.
Translucent feet in brocade slippers, slender ankles … From the floor Dean did not have a clear look, just an impression of … authority? He better make sure she understood they were on the same side.
“I’ve got your daughters, I can set all of you free from this place. But I have to find Ralph’s bone and he’s trying to kill me. Can you hold him off while I look?”
A gust of wind propelled a solid wall of pieces in Dean’s direction, Ralph completely concealed behind it. Dean must have connected with Estelle, because she held up her hands, palms flat toward the explosion heading at them, and its forward movement stopped.
That was good. Now how long could she hold it? Locating that bone with his arm like this …
“The … children … will … help.”
In the thick of battle was no time for second-guessing. Dad’s lesson: decide and follow-through. Adapt as the situation changes but don’t worry about what’s already done.
Dean poured the second bag out next to the first.
The little girls materialized locked together, then jumped to their mother’s side and transferred their grips to her. Estelle kept her hands up against the cyclone but looked down and obviously communicated to her children, for they blinked back in front of Dean, but didn’t look at him. They were staring at the attic floor.
Blink to a few steps away. Again. And then they were pointing, two little hands simultaneously flashing out, index fingers pointing together.
It was hell on his hand and knees to crawl over the jagged particles but Dean wasn’t going to try getting up. He went to where the fingers were insistently indicating. His own body blocked the distant illumination from his flashlight still on the floor, so he sat back on his heels and carefully felt with his good hand. Patted the area in a precise pattern, feeling for anything different than all the little broken bits.
He couldn’t have said how he knew, but he did when he touched a piece of bone as opposed to a pottery fragment. Dean brought it up to his eyes, and yes, it was a finger bone. Pinky, maybe. Didn’t matter. He had it. Now to get out in one piece.
He backed up to where he’d left the pouches, scooped some salt back into each one. He put Ralph’s bone in one and the wall of debris fell to the floor. Instantly Estelle’s spirit was focused on Dean.
“Got him in the bag. Gonna put your girls in the other one. We get downstairs and I put you with your daughters, then I gotta torch Ralph, then I can send you three … home.” Or wherever it is they go once Dean burned ’em.
She hadn’t especially communicated agreement with his plan earlier, but Dean took her non-reaction as a yes and proceeded to secure the children, get his shotgun, and make it down the stairs. Handrail being on the left did him absolutely no good so Dean was very careful feeling his way down. He paused to put Estelle’s bone away, and then it was out to the car and back to the motel.
Sam managed, despite his ribs, to pop Dean’s shoulder back into place and Dean figured it hurt equally bad for both of them. And he figured that gave Sam the right to bitch at him. Truthfully it hurt too much to argue back.
“Dammit, Dean, you coulda been killed!”
“Yeah.”
“That’s all you’re going to say? Yeah?”
“Ralphie had me in a pretty bad bind.”
Sam stopped. When realized Dean wasn’t going to fight back, Sam immediately switched tactics.
“Your face is a mess. Hands, too. And there’s blood on the knees of your jeans. Can you make it to the bathroom so I can clean you up?”
“I’m fine, Sam, shoulder’ll stop hurting in a bit. I can clean myself up!”
“I should …”
“You should lay back down in bed, okay? I’m gonna take a hot shower, it’ll help the shoulder and get the blood off at the same time. Efficient, you know?”
That earned him the best bitchface since this whole mess started, and for some reason that just made Dean feel better.
They actually waited a couple days so that Dean could use his shoulder to dig. Sam insisted on going with, and Dean didn’t have a problem with that since Sam was going as back-up to Dean’s back-up ghost. They were going to get rid of Ralphie first, and Estelle would be point guard during that, since her ghost powers had proven a lot more effective than the sawed-off.
Neither of them was surprised to see the grave had already been disturbed, the dirt returned haphazardly. From Clancy, no doubt.
“Should be a little easier to dig through,” Sam offered.
“Yeah. Too bad the little shit’s dead, I would’ve liked to talk to him,” Dean muttered.
“Actually I would have liked to learn what else he was doing, because something kept the wind out of the salt circle, at least until the candles went out. He had something there, could be useful for hunters, you know.”
Busy with the shovel, Dean only grunted.
“Must have been the candles, something unique about them.” Sam looked at Estelle’s ghost standing alert on the far side of Ralph’s headstone. “Wonder if she knows.”
“Go ahead and ask her. But she ain’t too talkative.”
“I …”
Sam was cut off by the furious shaking of the bare tree branches. Pieces of branches snapped off and rained down on both of them.
Estelle promptly pivoted and held up her arms to stop everything. In the bigger space, however, Ralph had the advantage of moving from tree to tree. Sam was ready to fire the shotgun but Ralph wasn’t visible yet.
“Hurry up, Dean!”
“Almost there!”
Shovel hit wood. Several more rapid scoops to the casket. Pried it open, threw in the pouch with Ralph’s bone on top of his skeleton.
“Sam! The lighter fluid!
The toss wasn’t up to Sam’s usual smooth standards but Dean caught it nonetheless and emptied it on Ralph’s remains. Suddenly the shotgun fired.
“He’s past Estelle!” Sam yelled.
The wind sounded like a rushing freight train, and Dean knew from experience that was bad. He jumped out of the hole, hit the dirt, and flung his lit cigarette lighter in the casket.
Another shotgun blast, “Dean!” then stillness. In the abrupt silence Dean was pretty sure Sam could hear Dean’s heartbeat.
Crap, where was Sam?
“Sam?”
“Ov’r here.”
The bastard had thrown Sam into one of the marble statues and Sam was slumped on the ground against it, still clutching the shotgun.
“How bad, Sammy?”
“Been better. Hit my other side. Which I guess is good …”
Dean carefully helped him up. “We can do Estelle tomorrow. We’re done for tonight.”
***
It was over.
This was as comfortable as he was going to get for a while, Sam knew. The passenger seat of the Impala was never designed to be the recovery spot for busted bodies, even though every Winchester male had used it for that. Couple of hunters who weren’t related has used it too, come to think of it. Dean had lifted a couple pillows from the motel to try and pad the seat for him.
Sometimes the driver was just as banged up as the passenger … luckily not this time. But even if he was, he’d still drive.
Because that’s what Dean did. But maybe Dean would get used to Sam being his partner now, as well as his brother. And Sam would get the chance to take care of Dean a little. Because the one guarantee Sam could see in the future was that this wasn’t the last time they were going to get hurt.