Instinct (3/8)
Over the next few days, they fell into a routine of sorts at Jim’s.
Dean would wake up early in the mornings, catching breakfast with Bobby and Jim before collecting Sam and heading out for a three mile run into town. Once there, he’d park himself on one of the small little tables outside of the creatively named Blue Earth Diner and order himself a cup of coffee, pretending not to notice when the waitresses slipped Sam bits of bacon and sausage as they made a fuss of him.
From there, it was a three mile run back, by which time Jim had normally finished the morning service at the small church and had joined Bobby in the study, ready through dusty leather-bound books on lore. Dean sometimes joined them, but usually begged out of their little nerd sessions, working his way through the list of repairs that Jim needed doing. The two of them would join again for lunch, and then part ways again until dinner.
After they’d finished their dinner, Dean and Bobby would scour the local paper for any hunts, sometimes finding a salt and burn to keep themselves occupied on an evening and sometimes not. It was nice, in a way, waking up and knowing what to expect from the day, but Dean had never been good at staying in one place.
It was no surprise to anyone when, on the fourth Friday that the three of them had spent sitting around and doing nothing, and with still no message from John to say he was close by, Dean announced that he was heading a few towns over to hustle some pool and replenish his slowly dwindling supply of cash. Neither was it a surprise when Bobby said that he’d join him. Hustling was best played as a two-man game, and though Dean knew from past experience that the other hunter would refuse any offer to split the cash with him, Bobby had confessed to him once that he sometimes missed the thrill of the scam.
Dean couldn’t exactly blame him, and half an hour later he was pulling into a small, run-down bar just three towns over from Pastor Jim’s house. The parking lot was little more than a square of hard-packed dirt, dusty trucks and well-worn cars parked at random intervals. Dean tucked the Impala into a space between a truck and a car, close enough to the door to make for a quick exit.
“You just stay here, alright?” Dean muttered, glancing at the dog perched in the passenger seat.
Despite his best attempts to leave Sam behind, the animal had managed to worm his way out of the house ahead of Dean so many times that, much to the amusement of Bobby and Jim, the hunter had eventually given in and resigned himself to the animal tagging along. Taking a good, hard look at the local bar through the Impala’s windscreen, Dean didn’t exactly regret that decision - hopefully having a dog like Sam in the car might deter the locals from roughing up his baby.
Ordinarily, Dean wouldn’t have ever even considered trying to hustle pool in a place like this - it was too small a town for an outsider to be welcomed, and certainly not the kind of place where they’d take lightly to someone walking away with their hard earned cash. Today, however, he was in the unusual position of having enough cash that it wouldn’t matter if he lost a few bucks pulling out early if things started to go downhill.
Whilst he’d be disappointed to walk away without any cash, today was more about the thrill of the challenge. And it would certainly be a challenge.
Grinning to himself, he slid his way out of the Impala - catching Sam by the collar and gently nudging him back inside when the dog tried to follow him out, and paused to triple check that the window was open enough for him before he turned and made his way inside. Out of the corner of his eye, he clocked the exact moment that Bobby’s truck pulled into the lot, circling around the cars. Dean knew that the older man would wait a little while before coming inside, playing it cool so that nobody would suspect that they were together.
The door was propped open, but almost as soon as Dean stepped inside the smoke-fogged room he was aware that all eyes were definitely on him. A few of the younger woman looked interested, leering unabashedly from their seats around the room, and Dean plastered on his usual shit-eating grin without a second of hesitation. He was nothing if not a professional.
He bought himself a beer and settled in on one of the bar stools to wait it out - ensuring that he had a good view of the pool table as he drained his first beer in one long pull and called for another. He was half-way through his third beer when Bobby strolled in, and Dean turned with everyone else to watch as the old man crossed the room and settled into a stool just three seats away from Dean.
The older man raised his beer, saluting another outsider, and Dean politely tipped his back before turning his attention to making small talk with the bartender.
He’d been drinking since he was a kid; he knew he could hold his liquor, but he was also better than anyone had a right to be at pretending to be falling-down drunk, and it was only an hour or so later that he finally staggered his way towards the pool table.
He timed his drunken trip to perfection, deliberately catching his foot on the bottom of an innocent bystander’s stool and stumbling forwards just far enough to send him crashing into the pool table. As predicted, his actions were met with laughter, and he made a show of shaking his head like he’d seen other drunks (and Sam) do from time-to-time, before lifting his head.
There was about eight or so of the local men loitering around the pool table, and none of them seemed overly bothered by the fact that Dean had just effectively interrupted their nice conversation, and he even caught a wide-set man leer at his friend before turning and offering him the pool cue.
“You wanting a game, kid?”
“Sure,” Dean slurred, being conscious not to over-do it. Nothing tipped people off to a hustle faster than someone acting drunker than they should have been - Dean had hung out with enough lightweights to know that four beers could have him on the comfortable side of drunk, but still fairly functional. As unlikely as it was that anyone had been counting how many times he’d flagged down the waitress, his father had trained him to be meticulous. “How’s twenty bucks sound?”
The man laughed easily, slapping a few crumpled bills onto the edge of the table and leaning forward to meet Dean’s eyes in what was probably intended as a move of intimidation.
“How about we make it fifty?”
**
Three hours later and Dean was three beers further into his act, and nearly two grand richer. Bobby, for his part, had a played a few honest games - beating Dean twice and pulling in a couple of hundred dollars from the locals, handed to him with friendly grins and a congratulatory clap on the back. It had been a good haul, but Dean could see the suspicion starting to swim in the eyes of a few of his opponents.
He knew better than to push his luck, staging a dramatic trip over the corner of the pool table that resulted in a smashed beer bottle and a small nick on the palm of one hand. It was a little more than he’d been aiming for, but it worked to his advantage, two waitresses rushing towards him. One of them collected the glass from the floor with a practiced efficiency, and the other fussed about the cut in his palm - extracting a small piece of glass from the wound.
Figuring that his injury was probably enough to throw the locals off his trail, at least until they got their wits together and realized just how much he’d taken them for as a collective, Dean nodded reluctantly when one of the waitresses suggested that it might be time to head home.
“I’ve got him,” Bobby’s voice offered, friendly and easy, and the waitress seemed a little relieved when the older hunter slung one of Dean’s arms across his shoulders, making a show of herding him towards the open door. “About time I headed out anyways.”
They kept up the act as Bobby steered Dean into the car park, waiting until they were nearly past the Impala before checking over his shoulder to see if they were clear. After a long moment, he dropped Dean’s arm from his shoulders and grinned.
“Not bad, kid.” He said approvingly. “Your little act’s gotten even better since the last time I saw you take a play at a bar.”
Dean shrugged his shoulders, sticking his hand through the small gap he’d left in the window, running his hand through Sam’s fur. The dog was stood with his front paws on the window, tail wagging behind him as he licked across Dean’s wrist enthusiastically. His hand reached for the Impala’s door handle, was just closing around it when a scream rang out across the car park.
Dean was moving before he’d even stopped to consider it, hand dropping to the knife hidden underneath his jacket as he took off towards the alley at one side of the bar, Bobby hot on his heels. He regretted, briefly, his decision to leave his gun in the car, and then he was swinging around the corner into the dark alley. He was perhaps ten feet in when a big, beefy man stepped out in front of him and Dean realized that he’d just ran straight into a trap.
Behind him, Bobby swore.
“Looking mighty sober for a kid that couldn’t even walk a few moments ago,” The man commented disinterestedly, leaning against a large metal dumpster. Behind him, one of the waitresses was standing with her head ducked, looking vaguely ashamed of herself, flanked by three more guys. A brief glance over his shoulder revealed exactly what Dean had expected to see: five more guys, penning him and Bobby in.
“Adrenaline.” Dean shrugged, resisting the urge to reach for his knife. For now, pulling it out wasn’t going to do much more than escalate the situation - he highly doubted that he and Bobby were the only two men in the alleyway who were armed.
“Seems likely.” The man scowled. “What do you take us for? Morons? You think we can’t see when we’re being hustled? You’ve got some learning to do, son.”
Dean rolled his eyes. “And I bet you’re about to teach me, hey?”
“Looks that way.” He grinned, and then all hell broke loose.
The men weren’t coordinated at all, the nine of them surging forwards at once, and Dean could almost feel the exact moment that his hunting instincts kicked in. He was moving before he recognized he was doing it; blocking blows even as he sent out a few of his own, feeling his foot connect with a kneecap with a satisfying crunch. Someone yelled in pain, hit the floor, and Dean caught sight of Bobby.
The hunter was holding his own, facing off against three men of his own whilst Dean handled the others. Someone swung towards the younger man’s face, and he ducked, using the man’s momentum to swing him face-first against the brick wall of the alley. He crumpled to the floor and didn’t move, and someone made an enraged yell.
It was then that the first knife was pulled, and it seemed like after that, everyone had one in hand. Dean produced his own, a wicked-looking steel number that gleamed in the faint light of the solitary streetlight in the car park. Someone swung for his neck, twisted and tried again for his stomach when he blocked it, and a whoosh of air alerted him to another blow coming from the side of him in just enough time for him to block it.
He knocked the knife clear from the man’s hand, breaking his wrist in the progress, and it was only when the man grinned a little that he realized his mistake. He’d spun to get the knife, leaving his back open and vulnerable, and the crunch of gravel was close - too close - and he knew that there was no way that he could turn quickly enough to stop the incoming hit.
He spun anyway. A loud growl rang through the darkness, and Dean’s eyes locked on his opponent in the same instant that Sam’s teeth locked around his attacker’s wrist and the knife - barely an inch from his heart - clattered to the floor. The man yowled, kicking desperately at Sam, but the animal held on with determination clear in the tight clench of his jaw.
Grinning now, Dean spun the hilt of his knife towards the man on his left, clocking him straight in the temple and sending him to the floor.
Someone collided with his side, sending him staggering for a few steps before his knife found purchase in the man’s shoulder with a sick squelching noise. A punch to the temple, and Dean’s path was cleared for just long enough for him to see the man next to a dumpster, arm raised over the spot where Dean knew that Sam was.
Terror struck him so hard that the world swam and he lunged forwards, desperate, even as the knife descended and he heard the unmistakable yelp of pain. The man cried out, yanking his hand back with blood dripping from his fingers. It was empty, and the unmistakable sound of metal clattering against concrete had never come.
Two men left now, one with his knife still sticking out of Sam’s skin, and Dean didn’t think. The knife flew from his hand with complete precision, hitting the man in the stomach. He didn’t care that it was more than likely a killing shot, didn’t even think twice before yanking his knife free as he stepped over him.
“Sam.” The hunter breathed, taking in the sight before him.
There was blood everywhere, splattered up the walls and pooling on the ground, dark and glinting. The man that Sam had attacked was lying prone, wrist and arm savaged enough that he’d likely passed out from the pain; the wounds didn’t look lethal, but some part of Dean wished that they were.
In the corner between the wall and the dumpster, Sam was slumped over onto his side, ribs heaving unsteadily and eyes wide with fear. The hilt of the knife was protruding from his side, and Dean couldn’t see how deep it was, didn’t know how long the blade was, and he felt bile rise in his throat as he dropped to his knees.
“It’s okay,” He promised, feeling tears well up in his eyes as he leant over, soothing a hand over the animal’s fur. The other reached for the knife, trembling, and he hesitated for a long moment. Taking the knife out could cause all sorts of damage; for all Dean knew, it was the only thing preventing the animal from haemorrhaging to death. The flip side to that, however, was that he couldn’t expect a dog to lie perfectly still until help arrived, and the slightest of movements could have his spine severed or a previously-untouched organ ruptured.
Already Sam’s front paw was starting to move, the animal’s head twisting towards the knife, and Dean knew that he had no choice. Praying that the blade was straight and not serrated, he gripped the handle tightly and pulled it free, tossing it aside. Sam let out another heart-wrenching yowl of pain, blood surging up to fill the wound even as his back arched and he bucked.
For a long moment, Dean thought that the dog was starting to seize, and then he found himself falling backwards onto his ass, scrabbling backwards as his brain made sense of what was happening. The animal’s limbs were lengthening, fur receding to reveal human skin; his muzzle and tail were gradually retreating into his body, the hair on his head lengthening.
Seconds after the knife was removed, Dean found himself confronted with the unconscious form of a teenager, naked save for a tattered pair of sweatpants that were stained with mud and blood and a red leather collar around his neck. Blood was spilling across his flat stomach and toned chest, and his eyes were closed, his lashes casting shadows across his pronounced cheekbones.
“Dean?”
The hunter jerked, wide eyes flying up to take in the sight of Bobby as he rounded the corner, panic clear on his face and blood smeared across one cheek from his temple. He was panting audibly, eyes taking in the frightened gaze of his younger companion before skipping over to the unconscious boy with the stab wound.
“Oh, Jesus,” Bobby breathed. “Did you…? And where the hell is Sam? I could have sworn I saw him dart past me.”
His eyes dropped to Dean’s hands, and it was until he registered that the man was searching for a knife that Dean made sense of what Bobby was accusing him of.
“No, it was one of the others.” He shook his head, pulling himself to his feet, and hesitated for a long moment before steeling himself. “Watch him for a moment. I need to get my gun.”
Bobby blinked his eyes dumbly, catching Dean’s arm when he tried to walk past him.
“Now you wait there a goddamn minute.” He snarled. “What the hell is going on?”
Dean sucked in a breath, and turned his head to meet the hunter’s eyes. “He’s a shifter.”
“Who is? The boy?” Bobby demanded.
Dean nodded.
“And how do you know that?”
“Because,” Dean replied darkly, glaring at the fallen teenager, taking in the uneven rise and fall of his chest. “Twenty seconds ago, he was Sam.”
Bobby sucked in a startled breath, and Dean took that as his opportunity to jerk his arm free and jog to the Impala’s trunk. His hands were shaking by his sides, mind working a mile a minute, body moving on autopilot. In his head, he could hear his father’s voice.
“Shapeshifters are one of the most dangerous kind of creatures, Dean,” The voice whispered to him, a long-distant memory of his father pointing to a page in his journal, blood underneath his fingernails and eyes hard. “Do you know why? Because they could be anyone… could be anything. The old woman in the room next to us - the one that gave you candy yesterday? She could be a shapeshifter. So could her cat. You have to be on your guard constantly, son. They’re always the people that you least expect them to be, and they’re smart as hell. They’ll play you, and then when they’re sick of their little games - when they have all of the information they need - they’ll kill you. And then they’ll move on to somebody else.”
Dean jerked the Impala’s trunk open roughly, and when he snapped the catch on the false bottom and yanked it open, something tumbled out. Dean caught it instinctively, glancing around to see if anyone had seen, before he recognized the stuffed animal was one he’d tossed in the shopping cart for Sam, all those weeks ago.
For a brief moment, his resolve shook. How could he kill something that he’d come to care so much about? How could he shoot him straight in the head, whilst he was bleeding from a wound to the gut that he’d gotten from defending Dean?
In the end, it was his father’s last words that had him grabbing his handgun and loading the silver rounds with shaking hands. He was a hunter. He couldn’t risk the chance that Sam would move on to someone else, that - after he was finished with Dean - he could take an innocent life.
He slammed the trunk shut with a final sounding slam, and jogged back to the alley. He was a little surprised that none of the men who’d ambushed them seemed to have roused in the time he’d been gone, and made a mental note that he should probably call an ambulance when they were safely out of danger.
Bobby was crouched down when Dean finally rounded the dumpster, and his eyes widened when he took in the sight of the gun in Dean’s hand. He stood slowly, as if worried the young man might decide to shoot him instead, and the hunter couldn’t help but scowl when he noticed that the older man had positioned himself directly between Sam and the gun.
“What are you doing?” He snarled, motioning with the barrel of the gun. “Move out of the way.”
Bobby shook his head, planting his feet more firmly on the floor. “Think about what you’re doing, Dean. This came as a big shock, son - you’re not thinking clearly right now.”
“I’m thinking just fine. He’s not human. He needs to be killed.” Dean announced, eyes locked on those of his friend. Bobby shook his head.
“Listen to me, Dean.” He said firmly. “I’m going to move out of your way in just a second, but first I want you to think about this carefully. Just because something’s not human, doesn’t mean it’s evil - I know that your daddy trained you to see these things as black and white, but that’s not the way the world works. Yes, Sam’s a shapeshifter, but for the past few weeks he’s also been your best friend. He’s had more than enough opportunities to kill you - hell, he’s been sleeping in the same bed as you every night since we found him.”
Dean lowered the gun a little, watching as Bobby stepped a little to the side, and for a moment he almost lowered it to his side.
“He’s evil.” He said, pleading with the older man to understand as he raised the gun once more, thumb knocking the safety catch off as his finger tightened on the trigger.
Bobby’s face fell, but he stepped all the way to the side like he’d said he would, giving Dean a clear shot to the shifter’s head.
“Is he?” Bobby asked, and Dean hesitated once more, tears welling in his eyes with frustration. His father had taught him that anything supernatural needed to be killed - he’d lived his whole life with a ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ policy, and lowering his gun now would mean accepting the idea that - somewhere along the way - he might have killed someone innocent.
On the floor, Sam stirred, hazel eyes blinking slowly open. For a few moments, they wandered without aim, unfocused, and then they locked on Dean’s face. Slowly, so slowly that Dean could follow their path, they fell down from his face to his chest, along the line of his outstretched arm and finally locked on the gun.
Dean waited with baited breath for the creature to attack, to launch itself at him, to try and defend itself. Sam didn’t so much as seem surprised. He sighed, softly, and Dean watched those beautiful hazel eyes - eyes that Dean would recognize anywhere, regardless of whether they were staring at him from a dog’s face or a human’s - fill with tears, before Sam shut them.
It took Dean a few seconds to realize that Sam was waiting for him to pull the trigger.
In the end, it was that dim acceptance of death that sent Dean’s gun clattering to the floor, and he found himself sinking back down to the ground, trembling with the knowledge of what he’d almost done. Sam flinched at the noise, screwing his eyes up tighter and this close, Dean could tell that he was shaking. His skin was pebbled with the cold, blood still seeping from his wound, and his brow glistened with sweat.
“I’m sorry,” Dean breathed, leaning forward and slipping a hand in the young man’s hair, stroking along his cheekbone. “Jesus, Sam. I’m sorry. We’re gonna get you fixed up, okay? You’re gonna be fine. It’s just a scratch.”
When Sam’s eyes blinked open again, they were wide and scared, the same look that had been afforded to Pastor Jim the first time that Sam had set foot in his house.
When he spoke, his voice was rusty with disuse and cracked with pain.
“Too late,” He croaked, and his eyes flickered up past Dean’s shoulder. The hunter glanced behind him, took in the knife lying where he’d tossed it, blade darkened with blood. “Silver knife.”
The implications that those words held had Dean’s breath catching in his chest, and he felt tears sting his eyes again. Silver was poisonous to shifters, killed them bit by bit, left them writhing in agony before it stole the last breath from their body. It was a horrible way to die, the worst Dean could think of, and it was a death that Sam had willingly condemned himself in order to save Dean. He’d sacrificed himself, and Dean had nearly shot him for his troubles.
He wondered if that might have been kinder.
“Dean,” Bobby said softly, squeezing the younger man’s shoulder. The young man glanced up at his friend, seeing his own tears reflected in the older hunter’s eyes. “There might be a way. There’s a shaman not far from here... he might be able to help. I need you to get Sam home, okay? Get him back to Jim’s and flush out the wound with holy water. I’ll call him from the road and see what he says.”
Dean nodded his head.
“Yeah,” He breathed. “Yeah, okay. Come on, Sammy. Up we go.”
He slipped his hand carefully underneath the boy’s back, easing him up to his feet as quickly and efficiently as he could, knowing from experience how much a stomach wound hurt when you had to move. By the time they hit vertical, what little color had remained in Sam’s face had vanished completely, leaving him almost ghostly white. He looked seconds away from passing out and when Dean tried to move them forwards a step, his knees threatened to give out from underneath him.
Bobby rushed forwards to support his other side as his eyes slipped closed, and Dean looked to the end of the alley, where he could see the faint gleam of the Impala’s glossy frame.
“He’s never gonna make it to the car like this,” he announced, shifting the boy’s weight more firmly onto the other hunter. Sam’s eyes fluttered open for a long moment, proof that he was trying valiantly to cling to consciousness, before they shut again. “You got him for a moment?”
He waited for the other hunter’s nod before releasing his grip completely, shifting so that one of his arms was underneath the shifter’s knees and the other was behind his back, and then carefully lifted.
Sam folded into his arms like it was what he’d been built to do, head coming to rest on Dean’s shoulder, and Dean thanked his lucky stars that the kid was a hell of a lot lighter than he’d expected. Shifting the kid’s weight slightly, he carefully made his way to the Impala, giving a few of the men a swift kick as he stepped over them.
Bobby slid the keys out of his pocket and rushed forwards, opening the Impala’s back door for them and rifling through the trunk until he found an old but clean-smelling towel and some bandages. He slipped a hand underneath Sam’s head as Dean lowered him into the car, supporting it until he was lying flat, and frowned when he felt the faint thrum of the boy’s pulse against his fingertips.
Between the two of them, they made short work of binding the towel to Sam’s side in an effort to staunch the bleeding, and Dean carefully tucked the kid’s legs a little more securely into the car before swinging the door shut. Sam didn’t stir.
“He’ll be okay.” Bobby swore, eyes lingering on the kid’s face for a long moment before he met Dean’s gaze. “We’ll get him fixed up, okay?”
Dean nodded, hand clasped tightly around the Impala’s door handle. “Drive fast, Bobby.”
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