A/N: This was supposed to be a mini bang, but it ended up quite a bit longer than expected. It was a lot of fun (and a lot of hard work), and I'm so glad to finally be able to share it.
Credit for the wonderful cover art goes to kuwlshadow. Check out her work over on LiveJournal! And special thanks to my awesome friends and beta-readers, RiverSongTam (who also submitted a big bang this round!) and Crosstown_Rapid. Without their encouragement and feedback I would have quit writing altogether a long time ago.
Who is the third who walks always beside you?
When I count, it is only you and I together
But when I look ahead up the white road
There is always another one walking beside you
Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded
I do not know whether a man or a woman
—But who is that on the other side of you?
~ T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land
Sam knows how to count, of course, has known since before he even started kindergarten, and considering he just graduated from Stanford he should be able to count how many people are in the Impala. It's easy, one-two, just him and Dean—at least, he's pretty sure.
He thought it would be harder to leave Stanford, but it turns out it's not so difficult to walk away when all you're leaving behind is the shell of a burned-out apartment and a shiny new gravestone where your girlfriend used to be. And then there was the way Dean leaned towards him out of the car window, the way he said, You know, we made a hell of a team back there—the way Sam's heart stuttered, stopped, restarted again in a whole different gear, like a car transmission slipping. It's only been a few weeks since then, but Sam's already fallen back into the rhythm of the road, drive-hunt-drive, as if that's the only beat he's ever moved to—as if the four years at Stanford were only a rest, or a pit stop, or a dream. Maybe they were.
They're stopped right now, having paused for fuel. Sam's eyes automatically seek the Impala's windows as he comes back from the gas station bathroom, checking on the occupants, counting them out, one-two—only that isn't right, because it's just him and Dean on the road, and he's still outside in the parking lot, so there should only be one of them in the car.
He thinks, for a moment, that maybe the third is John—it would be just like their father to lead them on a wild goose chase across the country and then show up unannounced at a random gas station—but when he gets into the car he finds that there's no third after all. It's still just him and Dean. One, two.
He twists to peer into the backseat, because even though it's clearly only them now, he's certain he saw the shape of another figure from the parking lot, dark and indistinct.
"What are you looking for?" Dean asks from the driver's side.
Sam faces forward again, settles into the upholstery, ignoring the prickle on the back of his neck. "Nothing," he says, because there is nothing back there. No one behind him. Just Dean beside him.
Dean's giving him that look again, the puzzled, measuring look that means Dean doesn't know what to say to him, how to respond. The one Sam hates because it makes him think maybe the years at Stanford weren't a dream after all.
Sam clears his throat, grabs the roadmap off the dashboard and unfolds it over his lap. There's an X circled in marker over a stretch of Colorado woods. Their destination, according to John's coordinates.
"You know, this place Dad's sending us is pretty remote," Sam remarks, measuring out the miles with his finger. "It'll take us till the afternoon, at least."
"Well, good," says Dean, peering both ways up and down the road as he pulls out of the gas station, though they're already so far out of the way there's unlikely to be any cars coming. "You can get a few more hours of sleep. I know you were awake last night."
Heat rises in Sam's cheeks, the way it always seems to whenever Dean pays him the least bit of attention—embarrassment and annoyance and secret joy, all writhing together in a fluttery mess—and he rustles the map uncomfortably. "I'm good, thanks," he mutters.
He intends to prove it by staying awake, studying the map and arguing with Dean over his choice of route, but there really aren't that many ways to get to Lost Creek, Colorado. The highway is empty and serene, nothing but mountains and trees on either side and gray, overcast sky above, and Sam is finding it difficult to stop his head from lolling against the window, and he keeps having to force his eyes back open. And then Dean flips the radio to a soft rock station, turns it down low, and Sam is done for.
The figure is waiting for him in his dreams, as if it's been there all along.
Distantly, Sam can still feel the road rumbling beneath his seat, the cold glass of the window rattling against his skull, and when he looks around he still seems to be in the Impala; but everything is dim and unfocused, the scenery outside only a haze, and his perspective is skewed, so that it looks like Dean is sitting several feet away from him instead of only a few inches. Sam stretches across, trying to reach Dean, to touch him—but a flicker of movement from the backseat distracts him, and when Sam turns to look there's someone sitting there all right, hunched in the shadows so that all Sam can see is the vague, flowing outline of a hood.
Sam reels back, startled, and he reaches out again to Dean, but Dean is even farther away than before, sitting frozen with his eyes on the road, and Sam finds himself turning back slowly to face the figure, like a compass needle drawn to magnetic north. This time, he catches the faint reflection of eyes under the hood, gleaming a reptilian yellow, and the figure lifts an arm, trailing shadow like a cloak, and salutes him.
Sam jerks upright and awake, gasping, to find Dean's hand hovering uncertainly in the air between their bodies. He's giving him a sideways version of that look Sam hates so much, and he's frowning, but space has righted itself so he's where he should be, less than a foot away on the other side of the car. Sam breathes out a long sigh, wanting to grab Dean's hand and pull it the rest of the way over, but instead just scooting minutely closer to the middle of the seat.
"You okay?" Dean asks.
"Yeah, I'm fine," says Sam. He watches Dean replace his hand on the steering wheel, precise and deliberate at 2 o'clock, a little white around the knuckles.
"Another nightmare?"
Sam gives a noncommittal grunt, which Dean seems to take as an invitation to ask more questions. "About Jessica again?"
Hearing her name makes Sam angry, like it always does, and he considers retorting with a truthful No, but he can't quite bring himself to say it. Jessica's not even two months dead, and already it's like she never existed; already she's been washed from his thoughts by the flood of Dean in the weeks since the fire—Dean sitting next to him in the driver's seat, Dean kicking him under the table at restaurants, Dean barging his way into the bathroom while Sam's in the shower. Dean fitting into the space beside him like the other half of a friendship charm. Dean filling up the gaps, making him whole. Sam almost resents it, how easily he's forgotten the grief that's all he has left of Jessica, except that he knows it's his own fault. He's always found it easy to lose himself in dreams.
But Sam has learned the hard way how to tell a dream from reality, and the reality is that he's with Dean for a cold, practical purpose; and the way his heart is beating double-time at the thought of Dean reaching out to touch him while he slept has no place in it. Which means Sam will be leaving again as soon as Jessica is avenged, no matter what his heart does. Even if it breaks.
*S*P*N*
"Any idea what we're after here?" Sam asks, as Dean turns the car off the highway. They emerge onto a much narrower road, with dark trees leaning in on either side, menacing. Their leaves wave a mocking farewell as the Impala speeds past.
"Nope," says Dean blithely.
"So we're just going in blind?"
"Well, I was going to check out the ranger station first, see if anything's going on, but if you'd rather skip that…." Dean shakes his head. "Man, what is up with you?"
Truthfully, the nightmare has left Sam unsettled and jumpy, but he can't explain that to Dean without explaining why it's affecting him so much, and if Dean's already giving him weird looks for things like ironing his clothes (a habit he picked up from Jess) or drinking frappuccinos (he discovered them during one particularly hellish finals week), then Sam doesn't like to imagine how he would react to the idea that Sam has prophetic dreams now, too.
"I just wanna figure this out, is all," Sam says instead. Dean snorts, but doesn't press him.
The ranger station turns out to be little more than an old log cabin tucked among the trees at the end of a gravel drive. There are no other cars in the small parking lot, and the only sounds are the creak and slam of the car doors, the crunch of gravel as they approach. Sam half-expects the door to be locked, the station abandoned, but it opens easily, and they file inside, their boots clunking on the wooden floor. It's so dark that it takes Sam's eyes a second to adjust. There's a boxy computer monitor glowing on the reception desk, but no one manning it; the room is empty aside from a few racks of maps and brochures, a glass display case, and various stuffed animal heads staring down from the walls.
Dean goes right to the far wall, clearly fascinated by the animal heads, while Sam examines a topographic map of the forest housed in the display case. According to the map, the terrain is rugged and mountainous. A dotted line marks the Lost Creek trail, the only way up onto Blackwater Ridge, and there's a scattering of red, spiky stars indicating the entrances to old silver and gold mines. Sam shifts slightly, not liking the idea of hiking through this forest without a clue as to what they're supposed to be doing there. The edge of his hoodie catches on something with a rustle; looking down, he sees a paper sign taped to the side of the case—Bear Attacks: Are You Prepared to Avoid One?
"Dude," he says, turning to look for Dean. "This is—"
But he stops speaking abruptly, because he was certain it was just him and Dean in the station—it was definitely just them, one, two—but now there's a third figure standing there, dark and bulky in the doorway. The switchblade Sam keeps in the pocket of his jeans is out and in his hand before he's even aware of reaching for it, and the only reason he doesn't throw the knife right then is that he can't quite tell, against the relative brightness of the open doorway, where the figure's heart would be.
Then the figure moves further into the room, out of the glare. It's just a man, a ranger; there's a badge adorning his jacket, and his face is lined and weather-beaten under a wide-brimmed hat.
"I hope you boys weren't planning a hike out to Blackwater Ridge," says the ranger.
"Why's that?" asks Dean. He moves to stand at Sam's side, close enough to cover the knife still gleaming deadly-sharp in Sam's fist.
"Trail's closed," the ranger tells them, while Sam tries to make his fingers unclench. "Because of the murders."
"Oh?" says Dean. "Suspect still on the loose, or something?"
"No, they caught the suspects, all right," says the ranger, rubbing his chin. "Normal people, until they decided to hack up their hiking partners."
Sam finally manages to fold up his blade and tuck it back into his pocket, and he stands there, still trembling with adrenaline, as the ranger steps a little closer and lowers his voice.
"When they came back they were...different. Goin' on and on about all kinds of weird stuff. Best stay away till we figure out whatever it was in those woods that made 'em go crazy."
"Yes, sir," says Dean easily, nodding. "We'll keep our distance."
The ranger gives a short nod, but he doesn't look very convinced, and his hand falls on Dean's shoulder as he makes to step past him towards the door.
"You're friends with that Haley girl, right?"
Dean's eyes flick over to meet Sam's, uncertain, gauging. It's only a brief look, but something about it settles in Sam's stomach like a pile of rocks, makes him clench his empty fist in sudden, sweeping rage.
"Yes. Yes, we are," Dean says, turning back to the ranger.
"Well, you make sure she doesn't do anything stupid," the ranger says. "Her brother and his friends are in the woods without a permit. The best thing she can do now is let him go, let us do our jobs to find him."
"Can't promise anything," Dean says, with another glance at Sam, and a strange, dark current in his voice.
By the time they get out to the car, though, Dean is grinning, bright and excited. "Well, we know why Dad sent us here," he says. "It's a hunt."
Sam thinks of the figure in his nightmare. He thinks of the knife in his pocket, knocking cold against his leg, and of the ranger's warning—best stay away.
"Yeah," he replies, hollowly. "Great."
*S*P*N*
"So there's something killing hikers in the woods," says Dean. "And the survivors take the blame."
"But we still don't know what it is." Sam punctuates this statement with a few loud taps on his laptop's keyboard, and then makes a frustrated noise as the motel WiFi cuts out again. "I mean, Dad couldn't have left us a hint, or anything? He just gives us these coordinates and expects us to figure it out?"
They didn't glean anything from their visit to Haley Collins's house that afternoon; there was no answer to their knock, so they took the liberty of climbing in through an open ground-floor window, but they found nothing of note aside from a large collection of photographs in the living room, all showing a pair of dark-haired children, the girl with her arm around her younger brother's shoulders. They eventually gave up and checked into the closest motel they could find, where Sam has now been trying for at least an hour to access the local news website for information about the previous victims.
The motel is a kitschy wilderness-themed affair, wallpapered in a hideous forest scene. Sam could have dealt with the tree trunks stretching from floor to ceiling, but he thinks the life-size pack of gray wolves slinking out from the shadowy background are a bit much. There's something distinctly sinister about their yellow eyes, the way they seem to fix directly on him, no matter where he is in the room.
"We need to talk to Haley," says Dean. "See if she knows anything."
"And I suppose you know where to find her," says Sam, relaunching his browser for the fiftieth time.
"Sure," says Dean, settling onto his bed and reaching for the TV remote. "Blackwater Ridge, looking for her brother."
"We are not going to Blackwater Ridge," Sam snaps, giving up on the WiFi and slamming the laptop shut.
Dean looks away from the TV to frown at him. "Why not?"
"Because—" Sam fumbles for a moment, trying to think of an excuse that won't make it sound like he's wimping out, which is surely what Dean would think if Sam told him that just the thought of going there fills him with the same prickly fear as the hooded figure from his nightmare. "Because it's a waste of time. We're supposed to be looking for Dad."
"There's people getting hurt," says Dean.
"We don't have enough information," Sam tries instead, keeping his voice calm even though his fingers are itching to latch themselves onto Dean's shoulders and shake him until he starts having prophetic dreams, too. "We'll end up just like them."
"You just don't want to be here because Dad sent us here," Dean mutters.
"I don't want to be here, period," says Sam.
Dean throws the remote down and folds his arms. "You can leave if you want," he says coldly. "Not like you haven't done it before. You know I ain't stopping you."
Sam opens his mouth to retort that yes, Dean is what's stopping him from turning tail and running all the way back to Palo Alto; that he left before to chase a dream, and found it as elusive and ephemeral as all dreams are; that the only reality he knows consists of Dean, and the Impala, and the road. But Dean is staring fixedly at the TV screen, his expression stony, and Sam hesitates long enough to remember that he promised himself he'd leave before he messes everything up again with his dreams and fantasies and longings. So he grits his teeth over the words without speaking them, suddenly too tired to do anything but heave a sigh and get into his own bed.
It takes him a long time to fall asleep, though, even with all the lights off and the TV on low. And then, when he does sleep, he dreams again of a figure hooded in shadow, stepping out from between the wallpaper trees; and once again, the figure salutes him, and all around the wolves come alive, howling.
*S*P*N*
The alarm shrieks them awake at an ungodly hour the next morning, pulling Sam into consciousness as though from the depths of a silent black lake, and he wakes gasping for air like he really had been drowning. Dean is already on his feet, striding into the bathroom without so much as a glance in Sam's direction. Sam nearly falls back to sleep again waiting for him to come out, and then, when he finally gets his turn, it's to find that Dean used up all the hot water, which means Sam's last shower before they abandon civilization for who knows how long is little more than a quick, frantic rinse while his muscles shudder and jump with the cold.
"You coming, or what?" Dean asks, not looking at him, when Sam comes out of the bathroom, toweling his hair off and shivering.
It's a question he never would have asked, before. It makes the cold sink right down into Sam's bones, and settle there.
"Let's go," Sam mutters.
Dean maintains a terse silence as they check out of the motel, load up the Impala, and take her rumbling out onto the road. Sam fidgets, unable to channel the restless energy humming under his skin; but he won't give Dean the satisfaction of making him speak first. For his part, Dean spends the drive slouched and sullen in the driver's seat, his lips pressed tight together and his eyes reflecting the clouds that are still looming darkly overhead, refusing to rain.
There's another car parked at the trailhead when they get there, a mud-splattered pickup with a lumpy tarp thrown over the bed. There's a girl standing next to it, strapping a camping pack over her shoulders. She's in shorts despite the early-autumn chill in the air, showing off long, slender legs, and she looks up at the Impala with big blue eyes, her dark hair falling delicately around her face. Out of the corner of his eye, Sam watches Dean perk up, his expression brightening, voice easy and jovial as he steps out of the car and calls to the girl. Sam hunches his shoulders and slinks around the back to get their gear.
"You must be Haley Collins," Dean is saying. "Out for a nature walk?"
"Are you with the Park Service?" the girl asks quickly. "I don't have a permit, so you can give me a fine or whatever, but I'm not gonna sit around anymore waiting for you people to do something. I'm gonna find Tommy myself."
"'Course," Dean says, holding up his hands in a placating gesture. "We're not here to fine you, don't worry. I'm Dean, that's Sam." He flashes the girl a wide grin. "You got room for two more?"
She considers him for a moment. Even from several feet away, Sam can see that she's blushing. He slams the Impala's trunk shut and hauls the packs over to where Dean is standing, his guts twisting.
"You want to help?" Haley asks.
"Yes," says Dean, just as Sam says, "No."
Haley turns to look at him, surprised, as if only just noticing his presence. Dean sighs, long-suffering, and then gives her a conspiratorial wink. "Don't mind him. My little brother gets off on annoying me."
Sam inhales too quickly, chokes, and coughs. "I'm not kidding," he says, once he can breathe again. "It's too dangerous. Who knows what might be in there."
He raises his eyebrows meaningfully at Dean, who has the grace to look a little abashed, but then Haley speaks up.
"My brother is in there," she says. "I'm not gonna just leave him."
Dean gives Sam a look that might have been a smirk if it weren't so hard and sharp and bitter.
"You heard the lady," he says. And with that, Dean and Haley turn towards the trail, leaving Sam with no choice but to scoop up both packs and follow.
*S*P*N*
Sam knows the sun must be at its zenith by now, but it makes little difference to the shadows flickering amongst the trees. The trailhead has long since disappeared behind them; they're deep enough into the forest they can no longer hear the occasional car whooshing by on the road. There's hardly any noise at all but what they make themselves—the crunch of their footsteps and the faint rustling whisper of dry, autumn-brown leaves stirring as they pass. They don't talk much, and even then not above a murmur, as if worried about being overheard.
Sam is sulking several paces behind Dean and Haley, panting and sweaty despite the mild temperature because he's still carrying both his and Dean's packs. His position at the back of the group means he can't help but notice the way Dean walks too close to Haley, letting his arm swing loose and easy to brush against hers, and occasionally placing his hand on her waist to help her over a rough patch. Sam expects Haley to roll her eyes at this, because she's clearly a strong, experienced hiker, but she just looks at him with those shining blue eyes, biting her lips like she's trying not to smile. Sam supposes he can't blame her, but it still sends a dull, furious heat rolling through him like a low-grade fever; and with every step he takes, he feels the switchblade shifting in his pocket.
He's so absorbed in watching them ahead of him, so wrapped up in the dark swirl of his own thoughts, that at first he doesn't notice anything different, aside from the shadows between the trees growing steadily thicker. And then, even when he does finally notice, it takes him a few seconds of counting the figures up ahead, one, two, three, to figure out what's wrong.
It hits him all at once like a ghostly blow—three figures up ahead, plus Sam trailing along behind, but Haley is the only extra person, so there shouldn't be anyone else on Dean's other side—but there clearly is someone else there, walking brazenly in the space usually reserved for Sam.
Sam lurches forward, the packs dragging at his shoulders, his heart suddenly pounding from more than just the exertion. "Dean, on your right!" he calls.
Dean and Haley both wince at his loud voice, pausing.
"What?" says Dean, looking around for danger, his hand stretching towards the gun concealed in his waistband.
Sam huffs his way up to them, grabs Dean's wrist and yanks him away from edge of the path, peering into the shadows, searching for the figure he knows he just saw walking along beside his brother like it belonged there.
Haley is staring at him, her eyes wide and confused. "What is it?" she asks.
"I thought I saw someone next to you," Sam says to Dean. He doesn't let go of Dean's wrist.
"Was it my brother?" Haley asks eagerly. She raises her voice, pressing forward, towards the trees on the other side of the path. "Tommy, are you there?"
Sam ignores her. "I saw someone," he insists.
Dean looks at him, lips tight and jaw clenched. His eyes look black in the gloom, dark and unreadable, like two little patches of starless sky. "Our killer?" he asks finally.
"I don't know," Sam answers. "I couldn't see much—just someone. A figure."
Dean shakes his head. He pulls his arm back, and Sam realizes he's still holding on. For a moment, he can't seem to get his fingers to work; but then his grip loosens, and Dean's hand falls away.
"There was no one there, Sam," says Dean.
"But—"
"Come on, Haley," Dean says, the arm that Sam just released stretching out to slide around her shoulders. "We better look for a place to camp. I think my brother's getting a little tired."
Sam just stands there stupidly, watching as Dean draws her along beside him, and they continue up the trail, their figures blurring together in the gathering dark.
One, two.
*S*P*N*
They pitch their tents at the next campsite they see along the trail, a relatively level stretch of terrain sheltered on one side by a tumble of rough granite boulders, with some clear ground surrounding it where the trees haven't quite managed to grow, although their branches yearn across the gap. Sam finds it unsettling to be trapped like this between the rocks and the trees, but he's too eager to finally set the packs down to complain.
He crawls into the tent as soon as it's set up, unrolls his sleeping bag, and huddles down inside. In theory, the tent is his and Dean's, but judging by the way Dean's been ignoring him all day—and the way he insisted on helping Haley with her own tent, even though she clearly had no need of assistance—Sam thinks he probably has it to himself. He tries to be glad of the extra space, but mostly he just gets a sick, dropped-stomach feeling every time he stretches his limbs unhindered, like he was reaching for some treasured possession and found it missing.
He hears a sniffle from outside, and then Dean's voice, gentle and comforting in a way that makes his heart ache. "Hey, we'll find your brother."
Haley's voice is thick when she answers. "I know we will."
There's a pause, leaves crunching under boots, a rustle of fabric. Sam imagines Dean pulling Haley close, tucking her head under his chin, and the cold of the empty tent settles around him like snowfall.
"You care a lot about him," Dean says after a moment.
"Yeah," says Haley. "Our parents died in a fire when we were little, so we grew up close. We're all we've got."
"I know what that's like," says Dean, softly.
"What about you and Sam?" Haley asks. "You two seem pretty close, too."
Another pause. Sam waits, listening, his muscles growing more and more tense with every passing second.
"Shame we can't have a campfire," Dean says finally, a little too loud. "It's getting pretty chilly out here."
Haley's answering chuckle sounds low and inviting. "A campfire's not the only way to keep warm."
Sam pulls the sleeping bag over his head, blocking his ears so he doesn't have to hear any more. He squeezes his eyes shut and wishes for sleep even if it brings more nightmares with it; and maybe Dean actually did him a favor by making him carry both packs all day, because he's so exhausted he drifts off almost immediately.
He thinks it's a normal dream, at first. One of those running-but-not-moving dreams, where Dean is ahead of him and Sam just can't catch up. Only he's in the forest, fighting his way through tangles of branches that grab and poke at him like bony fingers, and his switchblade is in his hand. Then, finally, the snagging branches release him, and he breaks through into a clear space.
The dark shadowy figure is there in the clearing; and instinctively Sam lunges forward, and drives the switchblade into the figure's lower back with a wet thud.
Sam has never laughed at a kill before, but it's such a relief, such a downright pleasure, to rid himself of this figure that's been haunting him, that he can't help it. He twists his wrist viciously, feeling the blade scrape and catch between the vertebrae, and then he yanks his arm back and lets the figure crumple to the ground at his feet.
It's only when he's kicked the body over that he sees the face—freckles standing out starkly on grayish skin, green eyes open and dull, a face he knows as well as his own—and he chokes on the laughter still tearing from his throat. And then he looks up to see the outline of a cloak on the other side of the clearing, between the trees; and he catches a faint, mocking gleam of yellow from under the hood as the figure raises its arm in salute.
Sam wakes gasping, with tears rolling down his face. There's a confused moment in which he thinks the whispering sounds he's hearing are the wind rushing past the tent—then he realizes it's a voice, murmuring Sam, Sam, shh, and there's a hand cupping his cheek, and a warm presence filling up that cold bleak hole in the darkness.
"Dean?" he croaks.
"Right here," comes the answer, and Sam lets out a shuddering breath.
"You okay?" Dean asks. His thumb smears through the still-wet tears on Sam's skin.
Sam just shakes his head. The space that felt so huge and gaping before seems to have shrunk, cramping them together so there's barely more than an inch between their sleeping bags. Dean's knee is pressing into Sam's thigh through the layers of nylon, his breath pulsing warm against Sam's skin, but all Sam can see, when he looks into the darkness where he knows Dean's face must be, are the death-dimmed eyes from the dream.
"I just...I've got a bad feeling about this case," he says eventually. It's an understatement, but he doesn't have time or words to communicate the weight of the dread that's been dragging at his stomach ever since they stopped at that gas station just outside Lost Creek. "I don't think we should be here."
Sam feels the sudden tension in Dean's muscles, pressed together as they are. "This is where Dad sent us," he says.
"But why should we stick around?" asks Sam, a little desperately. "They've cleared the forest, no one else is gonna get hurt."
"Haley," Dean answers, without hesitation. "She needs to get her brother back."
Something about the way he says it makes Sam open his mouth, but he isn't quite sure how to respond, and in any case the words get caught on the way up his throat, snagged somehow on the part of his heart that burned up and died along with everything else at Stanford.
"Right," he manages finally, a dull, heavy syllable. There's an ache at the back of his throat like the tears are trying to claw their way out again. Dean seems to sense his distress; his hand curves around the back of Sam's neck, pulling him gently closer—but the nightmare is still too real, too close, and at the touch Sam's palm tingles with a sudden sense memory, the slick slide of his blade into Dean's flesh. Shuddering, he turns himself over in his sleeping bag, dislodging Dean's hand and scooting away from the firm pressure of Dean's body against his.
"Sam?" Dean murmurs, behind him. "Look, I'm—I shouldn't have gotten mad at you last night." There's a swish of nylon as Dean shifts towards him again, reaches out to squeeze his shoulder. "Sam? I'm sorry."
"S'okay," Sam whispers, but he shrugs off Dean's hand.
"Tell you what," Dean says, immediately grabbing back at Sam's shoulder. "I'll carry both packs tomorrow. Huh? How's that?"
Sam breathes out a long sigh and shrugs him off again, without answering. Dean doesn't speak after that, and there are fresh tears on Sam's face when he finally falls asleep.
*S*P*N*
Sam wakes to the deep gray gloom that's all they ever seem to see of daylight here. He can hear faint sounds of movement outside the tent, the clink of metal and the drag of zippers—Haley must already be up and breaking camp. He turns over cautiously. Dean is fast asleep, still turned on his side facing Sam. He's between Sam and the tent flap, so Sam just lies there and watches him breathe, a steady beat of a-live, a-live, a-live, until Haley calls to them from outside. Dean's eyes flutter open immediately, and for a moment Sam forgets that he's staring; but then Dean's gaze focuses on him, and he glances away hurriedly, feeling as though he's been caught doing something he shouldn't. For his part, Dean gives no sign that he's noticed anything, just shimmies out of his sleeping bag and ducks outside without a word.
"Sleep well?" Haley asks as they emerge from the tent. There's an edge to her voice that Sam is certain has something to do with where Dean chose to spend the night.
"Think we can make it to the ridge today?" Dean asks, ignoring the question.
"Hope so," says Haley. "That's where Tommy's group was supposed to be camping. We should be able to pick up his trail there."
Sam and Dean stow their gear in silence, not looking at each other, while Haley scuffs her boots impatiently in the dirt at the edge of the trail. She takes off at a brisk walk almost before they've managed to hoist their packs onto their shoulders, leading the way back onto the main trail, which begins to rise more and more steeply past the campsite. Sam watches the sky through the branches as they climb. The clouds are so heavy they seem to be weighing directly on top of the forest canopy, although there's still been not a drop of rain. The terrain turns more and more treacherous, too; there are jagged edges of rocks poking out of the ground in the most unexpected places, and the trail narrows so that they have to go in single file, Haley then Dean then Sam, one-two-three.
Sam keeps careful count.
*S*P*N*
The campsite, when they find it, looks peaceful, undisturbed, two tents pitched side-by-side in the middle of a small clearing and a bear-proof bundle of food items strung up in the branches of a nearby tree. Something about the tranquility of the scene is unsettling, however; even the soft rush of their breathing sounds disturbingly loud in the silence. They circle the tents cautiously, edging sideways along the treeline. A flash of motion catches Sam's eye as they come around to the front of the tents, and he jumps, stumbling a little, but it's just one of the tent flaps stirring in a slight breeze. Then he realizes that the opening in the tent isn't the flap at all, but a huge, red-spattered slash, like a great gaping wound in the fabric.
Haley lets out a strangled wail and goes running up to the other tent, which is unzipped and empty but otherwise intact. She peers inside, and then looks back at Sam and Dean.
"Nobody's here. All their gear's gone, too."
"There's a trail," says Dean, pointing to the ground, where something rust-brown and sticky is splashed over the dead leaves and twigs, drying them together in clumps. "Looks like someone was hurt pretty bad."
"Maybe it was a bear attack," Haley says, her voice shaking.
"I don't think so," says Sam, squinting into the slashed tent. It's also completely empty except for a larger stain of dried blood on the floor mat. "A bear would've gone for the food, not the gear."
"Well, what, then?" says Haley.
Sam glances at Dean, who twitches one shoulder in a tight little shrug, his lips pressed together unhappily.
Haley looks back and forth between the two of them, folds her arms. "Spit it out," she says.
Sam waits for Dean to answer, but he's too busy scuffing his boots in the dead leaves on the ground at his feet, not looking at either of them, so Sam sighs and turns to face Haley.
"Look," he begins. "That tent wasn't clawed by any animal—the cut's too clean."
Haley frowns at him. "So what are you saying?"
Dean bends down and lifts something long and thin out of the detritus he just disturbed. "We're saying that whoever did this," he says, holding out the object, "was human."
He's holding out a small fixed-blade knife, sticky and caked with blood and dirt all the way up the handle. Haley gives a little gasp and runs up to him, gingerly taking the knife between her thumb and forefinger.
"This is Tommy's," she whispers, white-faced.
"Any chance Tommy could be responsible?" Sam asks.
Haley's head snaps up. "What?" she exclaims, outraged. "Absolutely not. Why would you even think that?"
Sam opens his mouth to tell her, since she can't seem to see it for herself, that according to the evidence Tommy's either dead or guilty, but before he can speak Dean is suddenly right next to him, too close, herding him towards the trees, muttering, "I need to speak to you in private."
The jostling raises a memory of another, darker clearing, of grappling with an unseen figure, and Sam steps quickly away from Dean, into the cover of the trees.
"Man, you can't just say stuff like that," Dean tells him when they're out of earshot of the campsite. "What's gotten into you?"
Sam turns to face him, and there's that look again, the one that says who are you and what have you done with my brother. "What?" he snaps, clenching his fists against a sudden, unbidden urge to punch that look right off Dean's face.
"Nothing," says Dean, shrugging, though his eyes remain wary. "It's just, aren't you usually the weepy-eyed sensitive one, and I'm Mean Mr. Mustard?"
"You said it yourself, Dean. Whoever tore up that campsite was human. Tommy's at least gotta be a suspect."
"Right, but..." Dean shakes his head, rubs a hand over his hair in frustration. "Come on, man. Her brother's missing. I mean, don't you understand how hard it is for her, not knowing what happened to him?"
"Got an idea about that," says Sam, glad for an excuse to change the topic. "Might explain why everything but the food was taken. Have you seen that entry in Dad's journal about wendigos?"
Dean's expression changes to one of disgust. "Oh, gross. You think Tommy….?"
"Got tired of trail mix," says Sam, grimly.
*S*P*N*
"What the hell is wrong with you two?" Haley demands when they try to suggest that she should leave.
Dean grimaces at the loudness of her voice in the tomb-like quiet of the campsite. "Hey, we just don't want you to get hurt," he tells her. "You have to consider the possibility—"
"What, that Tommy's a murderer?" Haley spits. "My little brother would never—"
"You don't know what your little brother would do," Dean retorts, raising his own voice now. "Trust me. You don't."
"The point is, it's time for you to go," Sam interjects quickly, before he can think too hard about what Dean meant by that, or the dark tone in which he said it. "You need to get to safety."
"While you do what? Hunt my brother down?" says Haley. She folds her arms and glares at the pair of them. "I'm not leaving without Tommy."
Sam hasn't met many people who can match Winchester stubbornness, and Haley, with those big, innocent blue eyes, doesn't look much like she could be one of them; but by the time dusk begins to fall, he's starting to think the only way they're going to get her out of there is if they knock her out and carry her back down the ridge.
"It's getting late," Dean says finally, glancing around at the deepening shadows. "We need to settle in and protect ourselves." He looks back at Haley. "Can I trust you to stay inside the camp, at least?"
She gives a grudging nod, and sets to work pitching their tents next to the two abandoned ones. While she's busy, Dean beckons Sam to the edge of the clearing, where they kick through the brittle, wilting undergrowth until they find a couple of sticks large and sturdy enough to trace protection sigils in the dirt.
"So, you gonna tell me what's got you acting so weird?" Dean asks, after a few minutes of working in silence.
Sam looks up at him, which is a mistake, because it means he sees the way the soft evening light catches the smooth curve of Dean's cheekbones, and the sight is so arresting Sam takes a beat too long to answer.
"Who's acting weird?" he manages eventually.
"Seriously?" says Dean. "The nightmares, the brooding? You think I haven't noticed?"
Sam digs savagely into the dirt with his stick. "I just want to finish this hunt and get back on the road," he says. "It's all I can think about."
"Hey, I get it," Dean says. "I know you want to catch up with Dad and find Jessica's killer. But…." He pauses, licks his lips, clearly searching for words. "We're not just wasting time here. We're doing what we're supposed to be doing."
Sam gives a derisive snort. "What, following Dad's orders like good little boys?"
"Saving people," Dean corrects. "Hunting things."
Sam swallows uncomfortably, his throat suddenly tight. It sounds so, well, romantic when Dean puts it like that—like something out of a movie, like a great American novel. The two of them striking out together, pitting themselves against whatever evil sons of bitches they find along the way, relying on nothing but their wits and each other.
"I mean, that's always gonna be our job, right?" Dean says, and the constriction in Sam's throat seems to tighten a few notches, so that he couldn't answer even if he wanted to.
Before either of them can do anything else, a harsh cry erupts out of the darkness.
"Help me! Please!"
The noise is shocking in the heavy silence, like a thunderclap, or an explosion. Sam scrambles to his feet, his heart pounding, clutching tight to the stick. Dean rises too, pulling his gun from his waistband; Sam can hear the faint click as he flicks the safety off.
"What—?" Haley gasps, behind them.
"Just stay put!" Dean shouts over his shoulder, keeping his gun pointed into the trees.
"Help!" comes the cry again, and it sounds human, sounds desperate, sounds like something Sam should run towards as fast as possible, but something about it keeps his feet rooted to the forest floor as firmly as any tree.
"Tommy?" Haley shrieks. "Tommy!"
Next second, there's a loud clatter of tentpoles as Haley abandons the half-erected tents and dashes past them into the pitch blackness under the trees, calling out for her brother.
"Son of a bitch!" Dean curses, taking a few steps after her, but Sam, still staring into the trees, catches his arm and yanks him back.
"What?" Dean snaps, glaring over his shoulder at him.
Sam can't answer, can't even shift his gaze to meet Dean's. He was sure, for a moment, there was someone out there in the trees, a dark figure flitting between the trunks, circling just out of reach of the fading light. A figure too big to be Haley. And something about the way the shadows clung to it, flowing and rippling, makes him certain it wasn't Tommy, either.
Before Sam can even begin to explain this, though, Dean tugs out of his hold and disappears after Haley under the dark trees, and Sam can't do anything but follow.
It's horribly familiar, fighting through the tangled trees, which grab and poke at him with with skeletal branches, pulling at his clothes and his hair and his skin. He can hear Dean crashing through the brush ahead, but can't seem to catch up; and there are noises from behind, too, pounding along like a second set of footsteps, slightly out of sync with his own. His fingers long for the reassuring heft of his switchblade, but Sam remembers his last nightmare, and he keeps his hand well away from his pocket.
He stumbles a bit when he finally breaks out of the trees' hold into a small clear space, and he looks around wildly, half-poised to flee back into the woods rather than face whatever might be waiting for him here—and there is someone there, barely visible on the other side of the clearing—
"Jesus, Sam," pants Dean, lowering his gun hastily. "I could have shot you."
Sam is out of breath, too, taking huge searing gulps of air, trying to swallow down the hysterical laughter bubbling up from his chest; he's never been so relieved to find himself on the wrong end of a gun.
"There was something—someone else out there," he forces out between gasps.
"Tommy," says Dean. "Yeah, I saw him too. He took off with Haley before I could catch them."
Sam shakes his head, scanning the trees, but the shadows are empty and silent and still, giving no hint of anyone besides him and Dean; and in the quiet it seems suddenly absurd to expect a cloaked figure to appear, saluting from the edge of the clearing.
"Looks like you were right about the wendigo thing," Dean continues. "He got away fast." Dean sighs in frustration, and Sam hears the metallic click of a gun safety catch. "Which means Haley's in trouble and most of our weapons are useless."
They both stand there for a moment, their breathing slowing down as silence settles back over the forest.
"We'll never catch him in the dark," says Sam. "Let's head back."
Dean nods, and Sam turns to lead the way back through the trees. It's only then that he realizes his switchblade is in his hand after all, without him remembering reaching for it, the blade exposed, a thin streak of silver in the darkness. He flings it away reflexively, with a noise of disgust, like he'd just discovered some ugly, unwelcome insect crawling up his arm.
"What?" says Dean, behind him. "Did you see something?"
Sam lets out a long breath. "No," he says. "It's gone now."
*S*P*N*
They make it back to the campsite with no trouble, but Sam's relief is short-lived. The clearing is completely empty, looking as untouched as if they've just stumbled upon it, the first people ever to break through the trees. The tents and all of their supplies are gone.
"Well, he's smart," says Dean, scuffing through the dry forest debris where Haley left the tents. "He wants to cut us off, strand us here."
Sam shivers. The temperature has dropped lower tonight than it has since they've been here, and now they have no shelter, nowhere to hide, and no weapons except for Dean's handgun.
He looks around and realizes, with a thrill of panic, that Dean is no longer beside him. "Dean?" he calls out, his voice cracking.
"Right here," comes the reply, and Sam spots Dean's head poking out from between a pair of nearby fir trees, which are so large their heavy boughs droop all the way to the ground. "Come on, there's room under here."
That's a bit of an overstatement; the space under the branches is even more cramped than their tent would have been, and pitch-black, so that Sam ends up practically crawling into Dean's lap as he enters.
"Sorry—" he mutters, backing off hastily.
"It's fine, just—" Dean says, and then there are hands groping over Sam's shoulders, latching on, pulling.
"What are you—?" Sam tries to twist away, but Dean drags him down with a crunch of dry pine needles, so they end up side-by-side with their backs propped against rough bark of the close-growing trees.
"—shut up," Dean huffs, loosening his hold but staying right where he is, pressed so close along Sam's side they're practically joined at the hip.
Sam elbows him, leaning away. "Move over."
"Warmer like this," says Dean, nudging even closer. "Now go to sleep."
He yawns, and is asleep before Sam can come up with a reply. Sam should be exhausted, too, but his heart is still thumping adrenaline-quick from their chase through the woods. And then there's the way Dean's head is tipped softly against his, and the way Sam is hyper-aware of all the places Dean is touching him, shoulder and hip and calf. His skin feels hot, sensitive, tingling with thousands of little pinpricks where the pine needles are poking through his clothes, and he would peel off his outer shirt to sit on, except he thinks the more layers between him and Dean, the better.
Besides, the discomfort helps him stay awake, alert, so the nightmares can't creep up on him.
Eventually, though, Sam's mind starts to wander, lulled by the steady rhythm of Dean's breathing, and he sinks into a doze. The blackness of the night seems to have invaded his mind as well, because he sees nothing but shifting, meaningless patterns behind his eyelids; but he has a distinct sense of confinement, as if walking down a long, dark tunnel, and he can feel the cold bite of a gun in his hands. He takes a few blind, stumbling steps, not sure if he's heading deeper into the void or back towards some kind of escape, and raises the gun without knowing what he's aiming at—and when he pulls the trigger, the darkness erupts in an explosion of light, and he hears his own anguished voice crying out, Dean! The sound echoes hollowly back to him, and he comes back to himself amidst a dreadful sensation of falling.
"Another nightmare," says Dean's voice, rumbling directly under Sam's ear, and Sam realizes that he must have moved in his sleep, because he's got his face tucked into the crook of Dean's neck, and his fingers are clenched so tightly in Dean's shirt his knuckles are aching in protest.
"Sure you don't wanna talk about it?" Dean asks, sounding pained.
Sam shifts a little, as if to physically dodge the question—but he's perversely even more exhausted now than he was before he fell asleep, and Dean's hands are skimming up and down his back, soothing, and he doesn't have the will to pull away.
"I keep dreaming I hurt you," he says finally.
"Sam, they're just dreams."
Sam shakes his head against Dean's shoulder. "You don't get it."
"What's to get?" says Dean. He doesn't laugh, but Sam can feel his breath quaking. "No way you can take me, little brother. That's just facts."
A surge of anger charges Sam's muscles, and he wrenches himself upright, colliding with the low-hanging branches above and sending a shower of pine needles cascading around them. "Will you just—it wasn't just a dream, okay? These aren't just dreams. They're real, they come true, and I dreamed that you were—that I—"
He breaks off as Dean pulls him down again, and resumes rubbing his back. "Sam. It's not gonna happen," he says firmly. "Whatever it is you think you're gonna do, I know you won't."
Sam is ready to answer that Haley didn't think her brother would do anything bad, either, that her faith in him didn't keep him from the darkness; that the same darkness has been following Sam like a midday shadow, lurking always beside him; that Dean is wrong if he thinks the worst Sam could do is run off back to Stanford. But then Dean moves so that Sam's head is cradled against his collarbone, and it feels wrong saying those words into Dean's skin, like some sort of blasphemy, so Sam just lets them dissipate unspoken into the air; and something in the atmosphere seems to shift, and the rain that's been threatening for two days finally comes down in a soft rush; but the little space under the pines stays warm and snug and dry.
*S*P*N*
It takes Sam a few confused moments to remember where he is when he wakes up. The point of his hip is sore where his weight is resting on it, and a knobbly tree root is digging into his side, but he's much more comfortable than he would have thought after spending a night sleeping on the ground, which he quickly realizes is because he's using his brother as a body pillow. He raises his head cautiously, and finds himself staring into Dean's face, inches from his own.
"Hey," Dean murmurs. He grins a little. "How'd you sleep?"
"Uh," says Sam, sleep-stupid and mesmerized. "Fine. Better."
And he's still staring at Dean like his eyes are stuck in this one direction, and Dean isn't looking away, and there's something about that look, the intensity of it—it's familiar, but also new somehow, different in a way that sends a rush of liquid heat into Sam's belly—and he thrusts himself hastily backward before Dean can feel the stirring of his flesh.
Dean sits up slowly, palms raised in a placating gesture. "Sam—"
But Sam is already pushing through the curtain of branches and out into the clearing. It's brighter under the trees than they've seen it since they got here, enough sun filtering through the branches to suffuse everything in a dim green twilight. Sam busies himself vigorously brushing dirt and pine needles from his clothes, ignoring the trembling of his fingers, and trying to settle the humming in his blood.
"So, what now?" Sam asks briskly as Dean emerges into the clearing with a crunch and rustle of branches.
Dean blinks at him for a moment, looking confused, but when he speaks his tone is perfectly normal.
"Haley might still be alive," he says. "Wendigos store their food. Maybe he kept our stuff, too—there's a couple of flare guns in my bag that'll work on him."
Sam nods tightly. He's never been much of a tracker, but even he can clearly see the ravaged trail where he and Dean crashed into the woods after Haley. Still, they have no supplies, no maps, and no way of calling for help; and besides all the supernatural danger, Sam hasn't forgotten the scattering of mines he saw on the display at the ranger station. They'd be lucky to make it back to the Impala, never mind wandering through an endless stretch of unknown terrain looking for a monster.
Tommy's trail is surprisingly easy to follow, however. They find a fainter path diverging from their own after a few hundred yards, and then a scrap of torn-off fabric caught on a sharp branch, and then a smear of blood across a trunk. Sam wonders if it's perhaps a little too easy, but the brightness of the day means fewer shadows, and Sam keeps counting the beat of his and Dean's footsteps, a reassuring one-two, one-two, and he's too absorbed with that to think much of it.
The forest thickens steadily around them as they follow the trail, and the ground drops sharply away; from what Sam can tell, they're descending diagonally along the side of the ridge. They walk for what feels like hours. Sam's stomach is painfully empty, and every breath drags on his dry, parched throat. Sometimes it feels as though their downward momentum is the only thing keeping him moving.
They walk right past Tommy's hiding place at first. They spend several long, confused moments thinking they've lost the trail, and they spread out a bit, retracing their steps. Then Sam feels a sudden exhale of cold, dank air from his left, and he turns to find an opening cut into the side of the ridge, the earth held up with thick wooden slats and a collection of broken, faded signs bearing variants of the same message: DANGER! DO NOT ENTER.
Sam jumps slightly at the noise of a snapping twig behind him, but it's only Dean coming up to stand next to him, facing the old mine.
"You coming?" Dean asks, tossing the question out like he did back at the motel—like he doubts it. Like he thinks Sam has some kind of choice in the matter.
"Try and stop me," Sam tells him.
Dean's eyes remain fixed on the mine, but his shoulders relax slightly. "Good. Gonna need some backup in there."
Entering that dark doorway is like stepping into the maw of a gigantic, slumbering beast. A gust of air rushes up from the belly of the mine, unpleasantly moist and foul-smelling. Sam covers his nose, trying not to think about what might be causing the stench.
The light from the entrance fades only a short way into the tunnel, and if Sam thought nighttime in the woods was dark, it seems bright as day compared to the all-consuming blackness of the mine. Sam can hear Dean beside him, his breath loud in the enclosed, silent space, his feet shuffling along beside Sam's, and Sam wishes he could reach out and take his hand, just to feel something solid and real, because down here in the dark it's surprisingly hard to be sure of anything. It's disorienting with no visual markers by which to judge where they are or how far they've come, and Sam's vision sparks with weird bursts of color in the absence of other stimulation, spots winking like so many pairs of yellow eyes peering at him out of the black.
A sudden bloom of light up ahead makes both of them pause. They creep forward, cautious, and the darkness lifts to reveal a large chamber, partially fallen-in, with faint shafts of daylight peeking through the ceiling. The horrible smell, which Sam stopped noticing in the tunnel, is overpowering here, and on the fringes of the room lie bloated, mangled shapes he doesn't want to identify. In the far corner is a jumble of old rusting equipment and fallen debris; and strung up by her wrists in the midst of this is Haley.
A flicker of movement to Sam's left, and Dean is past him, into the chamber, making straight for Haley.
"She's alive," he says, and gives her a gentle shake. "Haley? Haley, wake up."
There's a clatter of small, shifting stones, and Sam catches another movement to his left, across the opening of another tunnel branching off the chamber.
"Dean, I think somebody's home for dinner," he says quietly.
At this, Haley jerks to life.
"Tommy?" she says dazedly.
Dean hushes her, reaching up to free her wrists and setting her carefully on the floor. "Our packs are here," he says, nodding to a couple of dark lumps nearby. "I'll get the flare guns."
Sam nods, although the mention of flare guns brings to mind his most recent nightmare, and the flash of light that ended it, and a chilly wave of unease washes over him. Pushing the image away, he reaches down to Haley and pulls her arm over his shoulder. He can feel her sides heaving, her breath coming out in faint sobs and half-formed, incoherent words. Sam isn't sure how aware she is of what's going on, but when he pulls her forward she stumbles along beside him without resistance.
"Here!" says Dean, nudging Sam's hand with the cold handle of a flare gun, which Sam takes reluctantly. The metal feels harsh and unforgiving in his grip, and unpleasantly clammy from the damp underground air.
"Get her out of here," Dean continues. "I'll go in the other direction, hopefully lead him away from you."
It feels as though all the vague foreboding Sam has been experiencing over the course of this whole hunt is coalescing into one single, sharp point of terror. He has so many objections to this plan he isn't sure which to voice first, but before he can speak there's a stirring in the air, a disturbance like some sort of slipstream, and the faintest suggestion of footsteps from a shadowy corner of the chamber.
"Go on," says Dean, and he takes off deeper into the mine, shouting and yelling to the wendigo, and Sam has no choice but to tighten his grip on Haley and haul her back out into the blackness of the tunnel, keeping the flare gun pointed in front of him.
It's slow going. Haley is still disoriented and woozy; she keeps lurching from side to side, her arm limp around Sam's shoulders, and it's all Sam can do to keep her upright and facing the right way, which is hard enough to determine in this blank void. Sam is listening with all his might for some sign of anyone following them, but despite his efforts to keep quiet they're making a lot more noise than he and Dean did coming in, and it echoes strangely in the enclosed space, reflected scrapings and shufflings coming at them from all sorts of confusing directions.
Haley stops suddenly, and Sam has no choice but to stop too or end up dragging her.
"Tommy's here," she breathes. "I think he's behind us."
Sam's skin prickles as all the hair on his arms stands up. "Get behind me," he tells her, trying to push her further down the tunnel, but she clings tight to him, refusing to be budged.
"Tommy?" she says, louder.
And then, out of the darkness, comes the reply.
"Hey, sis."
Sam immediately swings the barrel of the flare gun up, pointing at the spot from which the voice seemed to emanate.
"Haley," he says, "get out of here, now."
She moves, but in the wrong direction—he only just manages to snag her wrist in time to stop her running towards whatever is waiting in the tunnel there, speaking with her brother's voice.
"Let me go," she whines, twisting weakly.
"Look," says Sam. "That's not your brother, not anymore. He'll kill you."
She stops moving suddenly, and when she speaks her voice is the strongest he's heard it since they found her. "He's still my brother."
Sam is so stunned he loosens his grip a fraction, and in an instant she breaks free.
"No!" Sam yells, but too late—there's a growl, a wet thud, a horrible gurgling shriek—then the soft thump of a body falling to the ground, and silence but for a slow, pattering drip, drip, drip.
There's an eternal second in which Sam stands frozen, feeling nothing but the cold handle of the flare gun clenched in his hands, the smooth curve of the trigger under his finger.
A soft chuckle slithers through the darkness, seeming to come from all directions at once. "You've seen him too, haven't you?" Tommy asks.
Sam's hand tightens on the gun. "Who?"
"The man with the yellow eyes," says Tommy, his voice stroking over Sam like a terrible phantom caress. "I know you must have."
"What makes you say that?" Sam asks, not really wanting to know, but needing to keep Tommy talking.
"Got all kinds of powers now," breathes Tommy. "Lets me see what a person's made of. What's inside them." He laughs again. "Yellow-Eyes sure wants what's inside of you."
Sam's finger twitches on the trigger of the flare gun, still pointed blindly into the darkness, and he has to make a conscious effort to still it—he's suddenly shaking, not with fear, but with rage—he's never wanted to destroy anything as much as the monster standing just out of sight, unless it were the hooded, yellow-eyed figure itself—but it scares him too, this rage. He can feel it burning in the pit of his stomach, and he knows with a cold certainty that if he lets it escape, this fire will consume him more completely than the one at Stanford ever could have.
"He's not going to get me," Sam says, through gritted teeth.
"You think you can run away?" says Tommy. "You can't, not from him. I tried, at first, but he's always there. Whether you know it or not, he's always beside you."
Then, without warning, light flares further down the tunnel. It's Dean, stepping forward with his wrists crossed in front of him, one hand gripping his flare gun and the other holding a flashlight he must have scrounged from their packs, which looks as bright as the Impala's high beams in the thick darkness.
"Sam, get down!" he calls, but Sam doesn't answer, doesn't because in the harsh glow he gets his first real look at Tommy.
His clothes are in tatters, jeans and windbreaker clinging to him like the last vestiges of humanity. His whole front is splattered and caked and streaked with mud and gore, his hair filthy with it, his hands so stained it looks like he's wearing a pair of hideous red gloves. Worst of all is the rusty red ring smeared around his mouth, and the motionless form of Haley crumpled at his feet, her unseeing eyes fixed upward, towards his face.
Tommy doesn't turn to look at Dean. He doesn't even blink. He stares at Sam and smiles a terrible, red-drenched smile—
—and Sam feels something in his gut twisting, something shifting, awakening, answering—
A wave of revulsion overcomes him, and he fires his weapon instinctively, emphatically, pulling the trigger back with bruising force. There's a bang and a flash, flames go roaring up to the ceiling, and Sam lurches backwards, suddenly afraid of what his savagery has unleashed.
"Dean!" he cries out, hearing the anguish in his own voice; he can see nothing but scorching reds and yellows and blues, the fire surrounding him as completely as the darkness did.
Then all at once a cool, dark shape is barrelling into him, shoving him up the tunnel, and the air itself is burning, the fire chasing them, and Sam and Dean stagger after each other, one, two, up the tunnel and out into the still-bright day.
*S*P*N*
Sam keeps running as they emerge into the fresh, clean air of the forest, allowing momentum to carry him down the steep slope, with no thought but to put as much distance as possible between himself and that hellmouth cut into the side of the hill, belching smoke and flame and the smell of burning flesh. Dean keeps pace with him, tearing through the undergrowth with single-minded ferocity, apparently sharing the sentiment.
They finally stumble to a stop as the ground levels out under them, and Sam collapses immediately in a relatively clear space, his arms flung out to either side and his breath heaving. Dean falls to his knees beside him a moment later, and Sam sits up again, reaching for him.
"God, Dean—are you—?"
"Fine—I'm fine—what about you, did it get you?"
Logically, Sam knows that Dean couldn't have run as far as they did if he was injured, but he needs tangible proof, assurance that this is real, that they've escaped, that the nightmares stayed just dreams, and so he worms his hands under Dean's jacket and shirt, skating his palms over the broad smooth planes of muscle, feeling the skin hot and sweaty and perfectly intact; and Dean kind of gasps, and his arms come up around Sam's back, and Sam leans in until his forehead is pressed against Dean's.
Sam doesn't realize he's mumbling out loud, a frantic refrain of I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, until Dean shushes him; and then he clenches his teeth shut and tries to swallow down the awful feeling rising in his throat like bile.
"I told you," he says eventually, his voice grating and rough. "The flare—I thought for a second—I could have killed you."
"You didn't," says Dean.
"I could have."
"You didn't," Dean repeats, stroking his hair, and Sam lets out a shaky little sigh, and huddles closer.
The light fades around them as they sit there, holding each other, but the shadows don't seem nearly as menacing as they always did before; there's life stirring amongst the trees, insects filling the air with a gentle humming and chirping, and Sam can hear the faint splash of what must be a stream running nearby. After a while, Dean stretches out full-length on the ground, settling Sam next to him, and the two of them stare up through the branches at the star-scattered sky.
"I missed this when I was in Palo Alto," Sam says eventually, lulled into a half-trance by the rhythms of the night, the steady whoosh of Dean's breathing. "Watching the stars."
Dean's breath hitches a little, and his fingers find Sam's and twine between them. When he speaks, it's so quiet Sam isn't sure, at first, that he didn't imagine it.
"You know how you said that you don't wanna hurt me?"
Sam raises himself up on one elbow to look at him, frowning. "Of course."
"Well, when we find Dad, and all this is over…." Dean licks his lips, hesitating. "Don't leave."
Sam stiffens, pulling back, because Dean doesn't know what he's asking; he doesn't know it's what Sam wants more than anything; doesn't know it's another dream Sam can't allow himself to have, because him staying could end up hurting Dean just as much as him leaving.
"I can't—" Sam begins, breaks off, swallows. "Dean, I can't—"
He's inching away, scooting himself backwards with his hands because he's trembling too much to get his feet under him and run like he knows he should, disappear into the woods just like Tommy did; but then Dean rises up, rolling over him in one fluid motion, and presses him down into the forest floor, holding him there with a hand on either side of his head.
"Don't leave, Sam," Dean murmurs, too close, so that Sam can feel the words brushing against his own lips. "Don't."
Trapped, Sam squeezes his eyes closed, his breath coming in hysterical little hiccups. "You wouldn't say that if you knew—"
"Yeah, I would," Dean says. "Hey. Look at me."
Sam doesn't want to, isn't ready to see whatever expression is on Dean's face, but there's something in him that refuses to turn away from his brother, and his eyes open without his permission and meet Dean's; and in them is that familiar-but-different look he saw before—a too-long look that pulls at him where he's been twisted-up and aching ever since he climbed into the Impala back in Palo Alto.
"Stay," Dean whispers, barely more than a breath. "Please."
And something finally aligns in Sam's brain, like a gearshift sliding into place, and all the tension leaves him in a rush, then builds again in a hot, sweet coil low in his belly. As if he senses the change, Dean's expression turns to a grin, wide and hungry and blinding even in the dark; and he leans down and cups a hand behind Sam's head and kisses him, there under the stars.
*S*P*N*
Sam wakes slowly, and stretches without opening his eyes, feeling his skin whisper across the patch of forest floor where he and Dean spent the night, covering the aches and bruises of the hunt with other, pleasanter aches. The forest is humming even more busily now, birds and small creatures flitting and chirping through the undergrowth, the air heavy with the tang of dirt and crushed leaves and sex.
Dean is nowhere in sight when Sam finally looks around, and he scrambles up quickly, discarded clothes falling all around him. "Dean!" he calls, his voice slightly strangled with the panic squeezing at his throat.
"Right here," Dean calls back from the direction of the stream, and Sam sighs in relief, glimpsing him walking back through the trees.
Next second, he freezes again, the panic returning with a vengeance, because there's another figure there under the trees, where there should be only Dean.
The figure steps toward him, tall and hooded, fixing him with a familiar yellow gaze, sweeping one arm up in a familiar salute; and for a second Sam feels it, a stirring, a craving, and a red haze descends over his vision; but then Dean is there, blocking the figure from view, and he kisses Sam firm and hot and sure, until Sam can't think of anything but the pair of them, one, two, here in the wide, sunlit woods.
Dean pulls away with a grin, and Sam keeps his eyes fixed on him as they shake out their clothes and dress. Then Dean touches his hand, tilting his head to the east, where the Impala is waiting at the edge of the forest, and they set off into the rising sun; and when Sam glances over his shoulder, looking back along the path to the mine, the figure is gone.