The two WIPs I've got going right now are so full of angst, I just needed to go on a good old-fashioned hunt with the boys—before angels and missing souls and all that emotion . . . *shivers*
Also, I'm a little behind on reciprocating reviews, but I'll get there . . . mainly for selfish reasons because I get introduced to a lot of good stories that way.
Pre-series. Dean is 20, Sam 16.
Usual Disclaimer applies: No rights to Supernatural are mine. *tearing up*
Gremlins
"Why can't we just go in and roast the things?"
John glanced at his oldest son, and placed his palm over the fidgeting hands, a warning to be quiet . . . and still. You know why, he hoped his look conveyed. They got one shot at this. They had to wait until dark when all the diurnal Gremlins returned to the cave. They had backtracked to it his morning from a fresh set of prints. They had to get them all together, not just the few that were already in there, because once the little nasties's cave was compromised, any survivors would scatter and it'd be hell tracking them all again.
Dean was a damn fine hunter and could remain scarily motionless when he had his prey sighted, but waiting for the monsters to show up, especially hunkered down without benefit of music or conversation, would never be one of the kid's hunting strengths.
Unlike Sam who had the rare ability to remain still and silent for hours. John let his gaze slide past Dean to the rocks and trees Sam wedged himself between a little higher up on the gentle slope. In the waning light, Sam looked like a statue. John hadn't seen his sixteen-year-old move for hours, though he knew that he had shifted, because the angle of his body was different from the last time he'd checked. A swell of pride rose up into John's chest. Even he couldn't reposition himself so smoothly that other hunters wouldn't notice. He'd been shifting clumsily himself, keeping circulation in stiff limbs that were eager for action. Of course knowing Sam, even though his body was completely relaxed, his brain was running a marathon, going over every tactic, each scenario, everything they knew about Gremlins, listening to every sound.
Sam's head turned, a slow unhurried movement that alerted both John and Dean to something coming. Then his eyes shifted back to John's and Sam dipped his head to the side. Over there.
Beside him in the dense scrub, John felt Dean coil, anticipation to finally get this hunt going, vibrating off him in pulses. John followed Sam's line of direction to the trees a few yards beyond his youngest. He waited, trusting Sam's instincts.
There.
A shape emerged from the brush, moving down the hill toward the cave. It had a huge elongated head, seemingly too large for the child-sized body. It skittered down the slope, moving on all fours like a hairless monkey, spindly arms longer than the stocky legs.
Another movement gained his eye. Sam had lifted his hand near his head. Knowing he'd only make a large move like that to purposely gain their attention, John yanked his gaze back to the kid. Sam flicked his chin in their direction. Both John and Dean swiveled their focus behind them.
Close. Another Gremlin moved just on the other side of the tree John had been resting against for the last couple of hours. A wide leathery hand, again disproportionally large for the small body, paused a mere three feet from the tip of John's rifle barrel he had stretched out to the side. His hand eased over the hilt of his knife.
Scratchy inhalations ruffled the static air as the creature sniffed. All three hunters were completely still, not so much as a breath. John had insisted the boys use his specialized soap and shampoo he bought at the Army/Navy supplies for the last few days, the scent-eliminating kind wildlife hunters used because it lacked any perfumes. They'd also made a fire before they started out on the trail this morning and each stood in the smoke. So they should be good, their scents camouflaged, except Gremlins weren't most animals.
And though they'd eat just about anything, this particular colony of Gremlins had grown especially good at sniffing out humans. It started as sheep, pigs, and goats going missing from the rural farmsteads, but the Gremlins had moved on to several daytime hikers, and were now being bold enough to snatch people right off the streets of the rustic town. Eighteen people had been reported missing in the last two months, leaving the local authorities baffled. As far as John Winchester was concerned, that was eighteen people too many and he'd be damned before there'd be a nineteenth.
The Gremlin shuffled sideways, still sniffing the air, but in the opposite direction. Its large hand scraped around in the dry pine needles and John's eyes narrowed at the glimpse he got of the palm. He'd never seen anything like it, wet and rubber-like in ridged puckers. He made a mental note to document that in his journal later. Could be important. Could be nothing.
Finally the little beastie moved on and the Winchesters simultaneously breathed. For the next forty minutes, they watched as Gremlin after Gremlin loped past them and entered the sideways slash in the bottom of the opposite slope. It they hadn't followed the tracks up to it, they'd never had known it was an opening to a cave. A rough knot was forming in the pit of John's stomach. He estimated a group of at least five to ten Gremlins, but as the count got up to twenty-one, knowing there had already been more inside before they'd even arrived, his worry intensified. He'd never heard of a colony this large.
Well after dark and long after they'd seen their last Gremlin scamper past and disappear within the hole, Dean stood up out of hiding. "Can we please go kill them now?"
#
This was the best hunt ever! Okay, the waiting sucked, but as Gremlin upon Gremlin showed up, Dean's excitement grew. He imagined turning the valve on his propane torch and flaming every last one of them. Because even though they could be shot or knifed, their vital organs were too small and difficult to get to, plus they healed too fast for normal weapons to slow them down much, so the optimal way to put them down for good was fire.
"Change in plan." His dad pulled a couple of sticks of dynamite from the duffle bag.
Or that could work.
The explosion would be cool, but not nearly as fun as hand-frying the suckers. "We're just going to lob one of those in there?"
One of John's eyebrows quirked. Obviously Dean hadn't kept the displeasure out of his tone very well.
"This is a last resort." John shook his head, frowning. The old man was worried. "There were more Gremlins than I expected and we need to get every last one of them. You boys understand? Every last one."
Sam had shuffled up beside Dean. "Yessir," they said together.
"We'll go inside the cave as originally planned . . ." John passed a small headlamp to Dean and strapped the other one to his own forehead. Sam frowned, disappointment evidentthat he didn't get one of the two headlamps. Dean shrugged, winking at the kid. Sam looked away in annoyance.
The boys followed their father down the slope like obedient pups made to heel. The entrance to the cave lay low and long at the bottom of the ravine and slope, a slash barely as high as their knees. It'd be a tight squeeze crawling in and Dean only hoped the interior opened up. Fighting Gremlins while belly-crawling on his stomach just wasn't appealing.
They set the explosives at each end of the entrance, then trailed the fuse lines several yards out.
Crouched down at the cave, John pulled the small propane torches from the duffle, passing one to each of his sons and keeping the third for himself. Sam let out a barely audible huff, staring at the much thinner propane bottle he had been assigned. Dean was completely attuned to his dad, ready to obey every order because this is when it mattered. His adrenaline was kicking in, his hunter instincts adjusting into a calm focus.
Their dad zipped up the duffle. "Dean, you follow me. Sam, you have the rear and charge of the bag."
"Yessir," they answered again in unison just before John rolled onto his stomach and wriggled inside lengthwise much like he would scoot under a barely opened garage door.
They waited until they heard their dad's muffled "clear" and then Dean scrambled in after him. He did not like the closed in feeling of the rock around him, but fortunately the entrance was only a couple yards in when the ceiling sloped upward, high enough that while standing they had several feet of clearance above their heads.
The headlamp beams scissored across the walls as Dean and John looked around. The cavern was more like a tunnel, close walls and stretching out into a darkness ahead that their lights couldn't penetrate. There wasn't a Gremlin in sight, but the air reeked of them, a putrid mix of rotting meat and wet animal.
At the scrape sounding behind them, Dean turned and dragged the duffle from the low entrance that Sam was pushing ahead of him. Squatting down, Dean watched the kid's hands emerge first, one fist tight around his slender propane bottle while he elbow-crawled his way through. Dean smiled, waiting for Sam's face to screw up as the odor assaulted him. Yep, there it was. Classic bleh-face, nose scrunched up. That never got old.
"You mind?" Sam squinted, lightly smacking Dean away to get the headlamp beam out of his eyes. Dean looked to the side, removing the direct light from his brother. He knew better than to limit someone's ability to adjust to a darker environment on a hunt, especially when that someone was Sam. The headlamps were a new addition to their gear and he'd have to get used to them.
"All right, boys," John spoke quietly. "Stay sharp. Dean, you torch anything on the left. I'll take the right. And Sam, you take anything that gets past us."
"Yeah," Dean teased. "Just don't aim your baby flame-thrower in our direction." Didn't matter because no Gremlin was getting past him.
"Afraid your fart gases will ignite and flame up your—"
"Sam!" It amazed Dean how his dad's whisper could still sound like a shout. Sam shut up, but looked far from repentant. Dean pressed his lips together to keep from laughing. He had to admit that was a good one. Sam looked over and must have noticed Dean's mouth curling because his own tugged up in a pleased grin.
Sam hefted the duffle over his shoulder and they started out. Another light clicked on. Dean looked back to see Sam had brought out his flashlight. For a moment he thought about trading his headlamp for it because he didn't like that Sam didn't have a hand free to turn the valve of his torch or grab his gun if needed.
It looked like the tunnel split up ahead, which was bad luck all around because if they took the wrong fork and the majority of the Gremlins were in the other one, they could get behind them and box them in, but as they got closer they found it wasn't two tunnels, but a section of wall that had caved in, leaving a thick stalactite-looking pillar standing in the middle of the tunnel.
"Looks like tonsils in someone's throat," Dean quipped.
"I think you mean uvula," Sam said. "And it doesn't look like that at all."
"Because it looks like a tonsil."
"How would you even know what—eeew." Dean's and John's beams of light snapped toward the direction of Sam's exclamation. Since he had the only flashlight, he'd kept his beam more on the floor while theirs had been directed higher. His light played over bones, a long thick skull, cracked femur bones that had teeth marks gnawed into them. They'd known Gremlins would eat just about anything, and apparently that included each other.
"That's just gross." Dean moved closer to examine the funky looking skeleton while Sam's flashlight beam moved away.
"Dad, stop!" Sam shouted. The warning tone had Dean swiveling around to see his father frozen mid-step, Sam's flashlight revealing the drop below John's raised boot.
Carefully John moved back from the edge he'd almost tumbled over. Dean and Sam raced to his side, all three lights angled downward. It wasn't exactly a sheer drop since the walls were bumpy with small ledges and protrusions, but their combined lights didn't reach bottom either. Dean toed one of the little rocks that littered the sandy floor over the edge. They stood silent, waiting for the echo that never came.
"Damn. That's ah . . . deep," Dean stated the obvious. Looking down into the dark hole, a sick feeling washed over him.
John reached across Dean to squeeze Sam's shoulder. When the kid looked at him, John nodded his approval. It was as close to a thank you as their dad ever got.
Dean resisted the urge to cast his beam over his brother to see if he was blushing like a girl. Instead he angled it across the chasm. It was pretty far to the other side with only a slight protruding lip against the bottom of one side of the wall. While he thought he could balance it no problem, he wasn't sure he was up to watching his dad and brother try to do the same. He also wondered how the fat-footed Gremlins had managed it. They did have fairly muscled legs.
"Dad, how far do you think these Golem-things can jump?"
Hands on his hips, studying the hole, John shook his head. "I'd say at least that far 'cause there's no other way they could have gone. Okay, we're going to need to—" John was cut off as one of the beasties dropped on him and they both went to the ground.
"Dad!" Reflexively, Dean looked up. His light played over several Gremlins crawling along the ceiling. Oh my God, the things could move across the rock like lizards!
A blast of fire sprayed over the ceiling—Sam's torch—a moment before Dean's joined his. Squealing, one, two, four creatures burst into little fireballs and fell to the ground. Another streaked by, falling into the hole like a meteor. Man! These suckers didn't just burn, they full on erupted. "Dad!"
"I'm okay."
Dean twisted to see his dad on the ground at the exact moment he kicked the creature off him and Sam's flame arced toward the beastie. Except the flame sputtered and died as Sam's propane ran out and the Gremlin launched itself at the kid.
"Sam!" Two jets of flame converged as both Dean and John eliminated the threat to their youngest family member.
Until another dropped onto him. Dean called out to his brother at the same time Sam screamed a warning to him and something smacked against Dean's back. He felt the burn of teeth clamp into his shoulder, heard both his dad and brother shouting for him.
Suddenly Sam was behind him, slamming the butt of his propane bottle over and over into the fugly that seemed stuck to Dean's back, while Dean twisted, turned, fingers scrabbling to get the thing off him. All at once, it came loose, pulling Dean off balance and fighting to stay on his feet, as his dad's horrified scream reverberated around the walls. "Saaaaaaaaaaaam!"
Dean spun, expecting to come face to face with Sam who was behind him. Except he wasn't. There was only empty air. Dean looked down and his world dropped away.
He stood mere inches from the hole.
TBC