Step Nine 3/7
Chapter Three
Dean glanced sideways at his brother in the passenger seat, and pushed the worry that kept clawing its way up through his chest back down. Sam was fine. The kid was dealing and they both knew he had more than most to deal with. More than anyone on the planet, he’d say.
Taking this hunt had been a good idea. Giving Sam something else to focus on, something to erase those fearful moments when Dean would look over and see his brother not entirely with him, staring off into some nightmare, and please. . . please don’t let it be the wall Sam was gazing at it.
But every time Sam came back to him on his own, his cloudy frightened eyes became clear again, so for now Dean let it be. He didn’t want to accuse Sam of poking at the wall, especially when the kid promised he wouldn’t. Look what accusations had done for them in the past? Driven Sam to do exactly what he didn’t want him to do.
“Kay.” Sam’s voice startled him from his thoughts. Sam continued to stare at the map he’d been studying for the last hour. “I think I have this figured out.”
A swell of pride rolled through Dean’s gut. The Cage, Hell, being soulless and re-souled, the devil himself, couldn’t ruin the intelligence of his brother’s keen mind.
“Lay it on me, brother.”
Sam’s gaze snapped up, brows high. “You’re in a good mood.”
You laughed yesterday. “Chasing a mountain man. That makes me the Lone Ranger. What’s not to be happy about?”
Chuckling, Sam rolled his eyes.
And Dean quieted, valuing the slight happy sound more than his sibling would ever know. He pushed for more. “That makes you Tonto.”
“What? Does not.”
“It totally does.”
Sam huffed and the exasperated sound of it curled around Dean’s senses. He just knew if he looked over now, he’d find the subtle beginnings of a bitchy expression.
“Fine.” There it was, that annoyed voice and it took everything in Dean to not break down and weep. It’d been months-months-since he’d gotten Sam back, but the kid hadn’t been fully back, too broken and guilt-ridden, a walking, breathing bag of sorrow. This-yesterday and now-this was the first real emergence of his little brother, and God he’d missed him.
“Tonto’s cooler anyway. Better tracker. Better everything. And he has a better horse.”
Dean pfffffed out a whistle of air. “Nobody’s horse is better than Silver.”
Sam only shook his head, grinning, and looked back at the map, signifying the argument was too stupid to bother continuing. Dean let it go because he was just so damn happy to have gotten Sam involved with the ridiculous conversation in the first place, and because there really wasn’t any counter Sam could possibly come up with against the awesomeness of Silver anyway.
“So what’d you come up with?” Dean flicked his chin up while snapping his gaze toward the map.
Sam’s features instantly lit up. “Okay, four scalped victims were found here, here, here and here.” Sam’s finger tapped each little X he had marked on the map.
“Kay. They’re scattered throughout that area.”
“Right.” With his pencil Sam connected the X’s, making a haphazard oval. “None of these four survived. All scalped.”
“Yeah.” Dean wasn’t making a connection yet. “So?”
“So, there were two other victims-“
“Who are out purchasing wigs. They survived, Sammy. Is that what you’re getting at, ‘cause when we talked to each of them, there wasn’t anything special they did or any type of connection with the spirit that allowed them to live while the other’s died. Just dumb luck. Happens sometimes.”
“Right. Except look. Matt started out here.” Sam tapped a spot within his oval. “Kevin said he was in this area.” He traced over a higher spot on the map, still within the oval. “But when they were found . . .”
“Those two both made it outside of your magic circle there.”
Sam nodded.
“You think something’s holding our scalper inside that limited area? That’s why he couldn’t finish Matt and Kevin off when they got out of it.”
“I think if we want to find him, that’s where we need to go.”
They were quiet for a moment. Sam went back to studying the map.
After a while Dean thumped Sam’s thigh. “Hey, Sammy.”
“Yeah?”
“Good call.”
Sam didn’t say anything, just nodded, though from the corners of his eyes, Dean could see Sam’s dimple deepen as his lip curved in a slight smile.
“But Silver is still the better horse.”
#
The warmth of Dean’s praise spread throughout Sam’s chest. He shouldn’t let it. He didn’t deserve it, not after what he’d let happen to Dean, but he was selfish, he guessed, because he let the feeling drift through him, savoring it like a long forgotten secret just remembered.
They were only a few hours out from the wilderness area and there was still plenty of daylight. Already a working plan was formulating in his mind. They’d hike in, pitch a tent far outside of what Dean called the Magic Circle. Sam smiled. Then in the morning they’d scout around and try and find out how to gank the guy. Could be bones needing salt and fire, though the odds of finding an old trapper’s remains weren’t high. It could also be some sort of object the spirit was attached to. An axe, his scalping blade. Again the odds on finding that weren’t the greatest. Then there was the mystery of whatever was holding the spirit to this one area. Maybe that was holding his spirit earthbound as well. Whatever it was, they’d have a better chance of figuring it out once they got in there.
And if the spirit manifested, that might give them an even better clue as to how to kill it. Just seeing a spirit, seeing what it had on him or what was missing sometimes offered the best solutions, like the Hookman’s, well, hook, or that doll that murdering little girl from the painting dragged around with her.
All they really knew about the mountain man was that any hiker stumbling upon him, first got scalped, then if they didn’t get out, had their throats slit.
Deep in thought, Sam looked up just as a headless corpse lobbed her decapitated skull at the windshield before the Impala plowed into her. Sucking in a huge gasp, Sam’s fingers curled around the dashboard as the car bounced, then bounced again as tires rolled over her.
At Sam’s gasp, Dean jerked the wheel. “Dude?” He began slowing the car, seeking a place to pull off. “Sam!”
Sam heard Dean, but he couldn’t tear his gaze from the head slapping against the glass, blond strands of hair caught in the wiper blades.
“Sam!” Dean was shaking him, the car no longer moving, the head no longer bouncing.
Sam wrenched his gaze away from the head, from the gaping eye sockets, seeking Dean.
Dean stared at him, worry lines etched deep within the bridge of his nose. “What?”
Afraid, Sam looked sideways at the windshield. The head was gone. He swiveled around to look out the rear for a headless body to get up and skip merrily away. Again, there was nothing.
Sinking down in the seat, Sam pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes and dragged in a shuddering breath. “Dean?”
“Yeah?” His brother’s voice sounded fragile.
“I think I’m losing my mind.”
“No.” Dean’s denial came too quick. “No, man. It’s just, you know, after everything, it’s just stress and nightmares.”
Sam lowered his hands. “Dean, I’m seeing things.”
The Adam’s apple in Dean’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. “Things from Hell?”
“I guess.” Sam felt his forehead crease. “Yeah, they’d have to be. Except I don’t remember Hell. I’m not sure, but . . .”
Warm fingers slid onto his wrist. “They’re that bad?”
Staring at Dean’s hand, Sam gave a tight nod.
“Sam . . .?”
“No, Dean, I swear. I haven’t picked at the wall.”
A heavy exhalation lifted Dean’s shoulders. “Not what I was gonna ask. I believe you.”
Sam lifted his head. “You do?”
The smile Dean gave him was kind . . . and sad. “Yeah.”
Sudden tears obscured Sam’s vision. He blinked to push them away.
They sat in silence while several cars passed by. Usually flowing with untapped energy, Dean gazed out the window, unhurried to pull the car back onto the mountain road, giving Sam the calm to pull himself together.
“Dean?”
“Mm-hmm?”
“When, um . . . when . . .” Sam studied the key hole on the glove compartment. “Did you . . . see . . . things?”
Dean turned to look directly at him. “Every day.”
“Oh.” That only made him feel worse.
“Sam.” Dean’s hand was back again, higher on Sam’s forearm this time. “It gets better.”
“How did you deal with it?”
Dean shrugged. “Did my job, went hunting. And then you were a whole ‘nother distraction. I had to figure out what was going on with you Ruby.”
“Great. My lying and sneaky around with a demon was therapeutic for Hell PTSD.”
“Hey, we take what we can get.” Dean leaned forward to get his face within Sam’s downcast view. “The point is, whatever this is . . .what you’re seeing, even though you don’t remember the Cage, and that’s good, Sammy. God knows I don’t want you to remember that. These things you’re seeing, probably just filler. Your mind knows you were in Hell, but without any memory of it, your brain is just making things up, filling in details.”
Sam stared at Dean, wanting to believe that. Could it be that simple? Just filler images. He ached for that to be true.
“So we’ll hunt, Sammy. We’ll keep you busy and distracted until your freak of a brain figures out there’s better things to dwell on. Okay? You with me on that?”
“Yeah, okay, yeah.” Sam nodded repeatedly, short jerky movements as though if he kept it up, it would make everything Dean suggested true.
And for several more hours it was. Sam felt a lightness that unclenched the constant terror from his muscles. For the rest of the drive and the hike into the mountains, even long after they pitched the tent and ate canned stew by the fire, continuing the banter over which horse was better, Silver or Scout, Hell stayed away.
Until Sam awoke in the middle of the night from a tug on his belly and a toddler, smiling as chubby hands pulled Sam’s intestines out from his bloody stomach.
TBC
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