"A Mother's Love"
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or its wonderful characters. I'm using them with love, care and the utmost respect. Please don't sue me for writing this. Besides, I'm rather poor and you wouldn't get much even if you did sue me. Emerson Weir is my OFC and like her or not, I own her! This story takes place about three weeks after "Unfinished Business", my first Supernatural fanfic. It might be wise to read that one first if you haven't already. Please note that this is the second story in a series. These stories follow the episode "Home" and take the Winchesters on an alternate route than the one they're currently on according to the show.
A/N: Mount Redding, Missouri is a fictional city, of my own creation. Ottumwa, Iowa and St. Louis, Missouri – not so much. I tried to use real locations in those cities but as I've never been to either city, I may have gotten some of the geographical stuff wrong. Please don't sue me for that either.
Ottumwa, Iowa
Wapello Motel
Sam blankly stared at the laptop screen, which seemed to be nothing more than a blur at the moment. His focus, his attention, wasn't at all on what he was doing. Not when all he could seem to think about was Emerson Weir and Mount Redding, Missouri and what had happened there just a few weeks ago. He sighed heavily as he tried to refocus his thoughts.
It had been about three weeks since they left the sleepy little town of Mount Redding. Sam couldn't really get anything out of his brother about what had happened after he kind of 'fell asleep'. The most that Sam seemed to be able to get out of Dean was that Sam had been 'asleep' for three days. When he woke up, Sam found that they were on the highway and were several hundred miles outside of the small town. Dean had been driving as if they were being chased, which in a way, Sam guessed, was almost true.
Dean explained to Sam – briefly and only once at that – that Emerson had said good-bye before they left and he had been driving ever since. And Sam resigned himself that it was all that he'd get out of his brother. Just that Dean had been driving for three days without more than one 15 minute nap, occasionally stopping for gas, food, coffee and bathroom breaks.
It took a little work on his part but Sam had eventually been able to convince his brother to stop at a rest stop along the way. He figured they both needed to stretch their legs and breathe some fresh air. At least that was what Sam initially told Dean. While there, however, he tried to call to Emerson. Dean did, too, without Sam knowing about it at the time. That was something they talked about later. Neither of them, however, had gotten through to her. Both ended up leaving her the first of many voice mail messages. Sam took over driving after their stop, letting Dean finally get some well-earned rest. That, too, took some convincing on Sam's part. It was, after all, never easy for Dean to let Sam drive in the first place.
Now, it had been about three weeks since they had last heard from Emerson and they were both getting worried although the boys seemed to show it in their own ways. Sam seemed to almost obsess about it and Dean seemed to quietly take it all in. Actually it had now reached a point where Sam was annoyed with how laid back Dean seemed to be about it all. Not that he expected Dean to get all obsessive about this but he just wanted to see his brother actually show some signs of concern. He didn't think that was too much to ask anyway.
They had worked a simple job in southern Iowa a couple of days earlier however. It hadn't been anything really significant. Just a minor haunting in a small house that was more aggravating to the people living there than anything else. No one had been injured but there were a lot of frayed nerves and the family desperately wanted whatever was in their home out. Still, it had been a decent distraction for the boys.
That little side job didn't mean that either of them had stopped trying to get a hold of Emerson though. Temporarily distracted or not, neither of them could shake the feeling that something was very, very wrong because that was the only plausible explanation they could come up with for Emerson not answering her phone and not calling them back. Sam and Dean had tried calling Emerson at least two dozen times apiece. They had probably left that many voice mail messages for her as well. Sam thought he had gotten through once but whoever picked up hung up right away. It was all very disconcerting.
Sam now glanced over his shoulder at his brother. Dean was comfortably sprawled out on one of the full-sized beds in their motel room with newspapers from various cities and towns in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri and Ohio surrounding him. They were doing individual searches for a new job mostly because Dean was itching for something to do. He said that he had 'cabin fever' and if Sam didn't want him to go crazy, they needed to find something to do. Dean hated sitting idly by, waiting for something to happen.
After glancing at Dean, Sam turned his attention back to the laptop's screen and forced himself to focus as he searched the website for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. He sighed again and tried to shake off the cobwebs in his own head. Taking a sip of the coffee he had next to him, he was doing his best to concentrate. He felt physically worn out from all the searching they were doing. Sam rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hands before he scrolled down the page, having been searching the site for local news stories.
A story had suddenly caught his eye for some reason that he couldn't put his finger on. He cocked his head to the side with this look on his face that showed he was curious. He got this feeling when he read it. That feeling seemed significant so he figured the least he could do was mention it to his brother. Worst case scenario, Dean would shoot Sam down. But if he was lucky, then they'd have something to do to keep Dean from driving Sam crazy.
"Hey, Dean," Sam called, nodding his head toward the screen of the laptop. "Come and have look at this."
Dean sat up, stretched out his legs, rolled his shoulders and yawned before rolling off the bed and slowly walking over. He rested one of his hands on the back of Sam's chair, the other on the desk and looked over his brother's shoulder to quickly skim the story. The whole thing couldn't have been more than two or three paragraphs long at best. "Three little girls. Presumed to have been kidnapped," he said with a shrug, taking his hand off of the desk and standing up straighter. "I hardly think this is the makings of a job, Sammy."
Sam rolled his eyes, biting his tongue before he said something about being called Sammy. It wasn't like Dean listened anyway when he complained about that nickname. He minimized the web page they were looking at and brought up a second one that he had saved with a similar story that had been printed a couple of days earlier. "For some reason, the authorities made more noise about it when it was just two girls but one of them is the daughter of a local police captain," he said with a shrug. He pointed at the pictures of the two previous girls which were near the top of the page with the story right beside that. "That makes at least three girls in the last two weeks, Dean. All with long, blonde hair and blue eyes, all 10-years-old and more importantly all three were taken from the exact same park, from the exact same spot." He looked over his shoulder at Dean with this 'see, I'm on to something' kind of a look. "I think we should at least look into this one."
"And this has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that we'll have to drive through Mount Redding on the way to St. Louis, right?"
Sam softly sighed, closing his eyes for a moment and taking a deep breath. That was something he didn't want to talk with Dean about. "I can start doing some more in-depth research now. You know, maybe find a pattern that goes beyond the obvious," he said, pointedly ignoring Dean's question. "Try to get us a little more to go on than what we have from these articles."
"Sam," Dean said a bit forcefully as he took his hand off the chair, standing completely straight now. "I'm serious."
Sam slowly nodded his head and turned in the chair to look up at his brother. "It seems like something Emerson might be interested in helping us with," he finally said although he sounded reluctant to admit it. "I thought that maybe if we stopped in to see her, we could see how she'd react to that."
"I honestly doubt that she's going leave with us anytime soon," Dean replied with a light chuckle as he walked back towards the bed. He sat on the left corner of it now. As he sat down Dean softly sighed but it was hardly a noticeable sound. "That's if she's even still ..."
"Don't say it, Dean. Okay?" Sam closed his eyes for a long moment. He wouldn't even consider the possibility that Dean was hinting at. There was just no possible way that was what had happened. Emerson had to just be avoiding them for some reason or that was what Sam tried to think every time he got her voice mail when he called her anyway. It was somehow more comforting to think she was just ignoring them. "She's fine."
"How do we know for sure?" Dean's voice was firm but a bit of emotion briefly seemed to show through. He was probably as worried about Emerson as Sam was but he was doing his best not let it to show. That would mean showing a moment of weakness and he wasn't going to let Sam see something like that if he could help it. "I mean, we've been calling her for like three weeks now, right? We've left her at least two dozen messages apiece. She hasn't answered her phone once since we left and she told me – point blank, Sammy – that she was going to go after that thing. We have to at least consider the possibility that she's ..."
"I'm serious, Dean. Don't say it. She's fine."
Dean sighed more heavily this time, his shoulders sagging slightly. It was like the thought alone was so heavy, too heavy for him to bear. "So what are we going to do? Huh, Sam? Are you planning to drive up there, stop in her store and just invite Emerson along? Do you honestly think that she's going to drop everything to come with us?" He shook his head. "Look. I miss Emerson, too but ..."
"Wait. What? You what?"
Dean chuckled, putting on a bit of bravado for Sam now. He cleared his throat before saying anything though in case any emotion would have slipped out to betray that bravado he was putting on now. "You missed all the wonderful bonding we did while you were 'asleep'," he said in a teasing manner, wiggling his eyebrows a bit. "That girlfriend of yours? She's a great kisser, Sammy." He made a 'kissing' face and gave Sam a big, bright smile.
Sam rolled his eyes, smiling a bit himself. He shook his head in an amused manner. He knew what Dean was trying to say in his own twisted way and Sam was glad to hear it. It was probably the first real sign Dean had shown of his concern over Emerson. "Then you know why we have to at least try, Dean."
Dean's smile toned down significantly and he slowly nodded his head. "Okay. You know what?" He clapped his hands once and rubbed them together before he pushed up off of the corner of the bed to get up. He grabbed his cell phone from the nightstand and wiggled it to show it to Sam, making his way to the door. "Why don't you see what else you can dig up about these 'kidnapings' or whatever the local police are calling what's going on? And I'll try to get a hold of her one more time."
Sam had a faint smile on his lips and nodded. He sat at the desk and watched as Dean walked toward the door while dialing Emerson's cell phone number. Sam quickly turned his attention to the laptop again, barely noticing if Dean was still in the room or not. He sighed and rubbed his eyes again before he dove into researching the job, hoping he wasn't leading Dean on some wild goose chase so he could see Emerson again.
