N.B.: I just had to write a story about Bobby, Sam, and Dean. So here it is.


1- Sorrow

Sam checked his watch, and wondered if Dean had finished digging up the graves yet.

He did feel a pang of guilt for not being there helping him, which was why he was loitering across the street like a stalker, keeping an eye on the haunted house. It was a weird situation, making it even more vital that they get this done as soon as possible. The house was sold after the deaths of the previous owners, but the family that moved in was plagued by accidents and injuries they attributed to "evil spirits". The house was then sold to a woman, Allison Gudas, who made something of a living as a professional skeptic. She was currently away, making it a great time to investigate what was going on.

From what they could tell, they were dealing with a poltergeist. The problem was they had three candidates. The family that had all died in the house previous to the accident plagued owners: Betty Stanfield, John Stanfield, or their teenage daughter, Penny. Betty died of cancer, John of a heart attack, and Penny of suicide. All died in that house, although at separate times. Dean put his money on it being Penny, since she was a teenager (prime poltergeist years), and had died by her own hand, but John had a rather notorious anger problem, including past instances of spousal abuse and aggravated assault in a bar fight, where he blinded some poor bastard in one eye. A violent asshole in life could easily be a violent asshole in death. And they couldn't discount Betty just because she was the wife. That was just sexism. She could be as bad as her husband for all they knew, just not caught at it.

So Dean was digging up all of them and salting and burning the lot. Sam was meant to be helping him, but they had an argument earlier, and Sam just need to get away from Dean and clear his head. The argument was, in retrospect, really stupid. He wasn't even sure what it was ultimately about, except Sam was tired of this. Why did they have to have such bizarre lives? Kids his age were supposed to be stressing about the SATs and homework, and hanging out at the mall, worrying about the spring dance, not digging up corpses and breaking into haunted houses. It didn't help that Dean seemed to love this life. His enthusiasm for Dad's bullshit just added to the trouble. Why? Dad seemed to treat Dean even worse than him, and yet Dean was like an eager puppy, always wanting strokes and praise, no matter how he treated him. Sam wondered if maybe he shouldn't take psychology in college, figure out what made a person that way. Besides low self-esteem and Stockholm Syndrome.

And he wasn't about to tell him he'd had a weird dream about something bad happening at this house. Because he wasn't a psychic like some of Dad's weird friends. It was just … nerves? Yeah, anxiety. He was afraid something bad would happen here, and he dreamed about it. Nothing more than that. Which was why there was no point in mentioning it to Dean. Or anyone.

Sam shivered and hunched deeper into his jacket, watching his breath turn into butts before him. He really should have been digging up graves with Dean. The activity alone would have kept him warm, not to mention the burning of the bodies. What did he expect in January in Ohio? It wasn't the Sun Belt.

He was stamping his feet, trying to keep warm, as a car pulled into the driveway of the house.

"Shit," he muttered, crossing the road. Just from the designer coat, and neatly trimmed brown hair, he knew Allison was back way too early from where she was supposed to be going. Maybe her flight was cancelled.

She was inside her house by the time Sam reached her yard, and he walked up the path, wondering if she would even talk to him. He was a sixteen (seventeen in four months!) year old boy, pounding on her door near midnight. If he was her, he wouldn't open the door to him.

Still, he pressed the doorbell. "Ms. Gudas? I'm sorry to bother you so late, but you really shouldn't be in this house."

After a moment, she opened the door a crack, looking up at him beyond a chain lock, which was still attached. These last couple of months he'd had a kind of freakish growth spurt, that made him taller then Dean and Dad both. After years of looking up to them, it was weird looking down at them. In more ways than one.

Although he could only see one of her gray-blue eyes, it seemed to be communicating great hostility. "Who the hell are you?"

"My name's Sam Winchester, ma'am. I know you don't believe in this sort of thing, and I don't blame you, really, it sounds crazy. But there's a dangerous poltergeist in your house. We're trying to get rid of it, but –"

She slammed the door in his face. "Ma'am? Please, I know how insane this sounds, but –"

"Go away or I call the police!" she shouted. It sounded like she was well away from the door.

Fuck. What did he do? Sam figured he'd have to hope for the best. Maybe the poltergeist would be quiet tonight. It wasn't always active. It seemed to hold to a schedule that neither he nor Dean or Bobby could ferret out.

Sam had gotten half way across the yard when he heard Allison scream.

He charged back at the door, which was still locked. It wasn't the ghost holding it shut, was it? He tried to kick down the door like he'd seen Dean do, but he didn't hit the right place, as the door stayed shut, and pain traveled up his leg. So he stopped doing it Dean's way and did it his own way, throwing himself bodily into the door shoulder first. On the third hit, the jamb splintered, and he fell inside the foyer.

Allison was still screaming, so he followed the noise to the kitchen, pulling out the iron crowbar he brought with him, just in case of ghost encounter. It looked like Allison was pinned against her refrigerator by a spectral figure, mostly translucent but still undeniably there. Sam advanced on the figure, crowbar raised, but then the spirit turned towards him.

Mid-swing, he was thrown across the room, hitting a cabinet at absolutely the wrong angle, and before he hit the floor, he heard as well as felt a crack. The pain was electric as it surged up his arm, and he screamed as he hit the floor and landed on it. Yep, pretty sure that was broken.

The specter had turned its attention to him, and he saw it was a teenaged girl in what looked like sweats. So it was Penny. That made sense.

Suddenly debris pelted him as all the drawers in the counter above him opened and turned upside down. Despite the fact that it was mostly cutlery, it didn't really hurt, except when he tried to move, and then the pain in his right arm went nuclear. "Penny, stop!" he said, biting back a scream. He did his best to blink away the tears of pain, and look around. He'd dropped the crowbar, and it was somehow under the kitchen table. Way too far away for him to reach it. Damn it. "I know you're angry. I know your life was miserable. But she has nothing to do with that, and neither do I. You have the power to stop this, Penny. Don't be like your father."

She glared at him, her eyes distorted black holes in her head, and Sam found himself thrown up into the ceiling, and then dropped back to the floor, where he landed on his broken arm again and screamed. Allison was still screaming too, which didn't help anything.

Sam rolled over onto his back, his right arm throbbing like a second heartbeat, his consciousness still reeling from taking a ride to the ceiling and back. The semi-translucent figure of Penny was looming over him, reaching down, and there was nothing he could do to stop her. He couldn't reach her. The fact that her face was distorted, as if partially rotted, was simply a reflection of what her state of mind was. After a while, ghosts went crazy. Not all went full poltergeist. Those that did usually had miserable lives or deaths (or both), and a shit ton of rage, that just mutated into something even worse over time. He really should have stayed in the graveyard with Dean.

She was reaching towards his face when her fingertips started to glow, and suddenly her arm was consumed in fire. It ran up her entire body, and she screeched in horror as she burned her away to nothing.

Sam could have cheered. Dean had decided to go with his hunch and burn her first. Thank God. He tasted blood in his mouth, and hoped he hadn't bit his tongue. "What the hell just happened?" Allison shouted.

"You're welcome," Sam said, and closed his eyes. The darkness was nice and quiet.


Bobby was not surprised that Dean met him in the parking lot. "This is all my fault," he began, his body language betraying all the hallmark tics of anxiety and probably way too much caffeine. He had dark circles under his eyes that might as well have been drawn on in Sharpie. "We had a fight, I don't really know what it was about, he was just being a damn teenager, but I shouldn't-"

"Son," Bobby said, grabbing Dean firmly by the shoulders and stilling him. Dean looked up with his head slightly bowed, like he was a dog expecting a smack across the nose with a rolled newspaper. That made something in Bobby's gut roil. Damn you, John. What did you do to your fucking kids? "Sam just has a broken arm and a few cracked ribs, right?"

"Yeah, but I –"

"Shut it. Considering he tangled with a poltergeist, he got off easy. And stop it with this nonsense that it was all your fault. He made his choice. He protected the homeowner, and you got the job done. You both did what you were supposed to do, and nobody died. We're ahead of the game."

He stared at Dean until he believed him, and finally Dean sighed, shoulders sagging in exhaustion and relief. "I still shoulda gone after him."

"Then maybe you'd both be dead, so I'm glad you didn't." He patted Dean on the back, trying to get him to ease up on himself. No one was harder on Dean than Dean, although John tried his damnedest. He'd just conditioned the boy too well. Somehow the message 'you can always improve' got twisted into "you will never be good enough', and considering that Dean was an adult now (well, legally in a few days, but at heart he'd pretty much been an adult since Bobby had known him), that message was never going to change. "You been up all night?"

He nodded. "I was just finishing up at the graveyard when a doctor from the E.R. called me. I was the emergency contact on Sam's phone. The homeowner apparently called an ambulance for him, as the poltergeist knocked him out. They wanted to keep him overnight 'cause, you know, head injuries, but he doesn't have a concussion. I know the kid, he's fine, and he's itching to get outta here."

Bobby nodded, and let Dean lead the way inside the hospital. John was supposedly busy hunting some werewolves down in Texas, so Dean called him, figuring Sam probably needed to get off the road and recover for a bit. Bobby suspected Dean also wanted a break too, but wasn't about to admit it. But the kid looked all in, exhausted, wired, the whole nine yards of fucked up. He looked a little skinny too, like maybe he hadn't been eating so well. Which was kind of a warning sign with Dean, as he was a notorious chow hound.

Did he suspect that John wasn't really hunting werewolves, but following up on some rumors about demon nests and yellow eyes? Because that's what he was really doing. He didn't tell Dean or Sam, because they'd want to come with him, or at least Dean would. And John didn't want that. He wouldn't even tell Bobby why, except it was better for the boys to stay as far from demons as possible.

Which was bullshit. If John was actually worried about exposing the boys to danger, he never would have taken them on the road in the first place. So what was he up to? John could lie to his boys, but Bobby hated being lied to and expecting to just take it. But John was a stubborn asshole, and Bobby couldn't make him tell him the truth. Not yet. Maybe he was afraid it would get back to his boys.

So Bobby had driven all the way to Ohio, put on a (monkey) suit, and was pretending to be their dad so he could check Sam out of the hospital, and then start the long drive back to his place. He kind of felt bad for Sam and Dean, because he was all they had without their Dad, and who would ever settle for him if they had another option? He was a crotchety old drunk with an auto wrecking yard and not much else.

Dean hadn't been kidding about Sam's eagerness to leave. He was dressed and sitting on the edge of his hospital bed, right arm in a cast and a sling. He was the color of boiled oatmeal, so Bobby figured he was still dealing with some pain, but the moment they entered the room he hopped to his feet. "Thanks, Bobby."

"I wasn't gonna leave you here," he replied, not sure why either of them would thank him. It was the only decent thing to do. (And why John wasn't hauling his ass here he had no idea.) Sam was sixteen, sure, and much like Dean acted a little older than he was, but he was still a kid. His actual Dad should be here, not him.

Bobby mentally cursed John for the first half of the drive back. He stopped for some food, which Dean suggested so Sam could take some pain meds. Dean was very much like a mother hen to Sam, which was both sweet and distressing. He was so accustomed to looking after his brother he did it automatically, and he was almost treating Sam more like his son than his brother, which was just another thing Bobby wanted to punch John for. John was Sam's father, and he should fucking act like it more, not delegate it part of the time to Dean. But he'd had this argument with him before, and had gotten exactly nowhere. He and John maybe spoke a handful of words to each other now, and all because of the boys. Not that they knew. They tried to keep them out of this argument. It wasn't fair to them.

But once the pain pills made Sam nod off, Dean finally gave in to his own exhaustion and slept too, propped up against the passenger door like he was going to jump out the moment he woke up. Always ready to fight. Bobby noticed at least one gun bulge under his coat, and maybe a knife too. He couldn't tell if Sam had any weapons on him, but probably. Would they be Winchesters if they weren't always ready to fight? Bobby was kind of tired himself, but anger at John Winchester more than kept him awake.

As soon as Bobby parked the car, the jolt seemed to wake up Dean, who shook Sam awake. It was like a drill they all knew so well. Hell, they had their own designated rooms upstairs, and he let them go ahead and lead the way.

He knew he should probably get some shut eye himself, but instead he stayed in the kitchen and had a beer, and called John. He got his voice mail, so he told him simply he had the boys, and he could pick them up whenever he was done on his hunting trip. He tried not to let too much sarcasm escape into his voice, but it was difficult. It wasn't that he didn't get it. Bobby had lost a wife too. But John had kids, and he should have devoted his energy to looking after them, not training them to take on all monsters single handedly.

But what the fuck did he know? Sam and Dean weren't his sons. They just sort of felt like it.

He went to the living room and settled in to catch the weather report, as they supposedly had a big storm headed their way, and he needed to know what he should prepare for. Winter, even this late into it, was always a boom time for the yard. Lots of cars spun out on black ice, lots of jackasses figured their tires were "good enough" or they could handle driving in the ice and snow, and about eighty percent of the time they were completely wrong. The lucky ones just wrecked their cars. The unlucky ones … well, that went without saying. It was actually good to have Dean here, because he could help him out with towing the wrecks and evaluating them. He was really good with cars.

Even though the boys were upstairs, the house felt different. Bobby got so accustomed to being by himself, when they stayed here, it was like the energy changed. There was genuine life in the house. When he was by himself again, it was like the place was empty in spite of him. Sometimes he felt like a ghost, haunting his own life.

Bobby dozed off without realizing it, until the ring of the phone woke him. He stumbled bleary eyed towards his phone bank, until he figured out which one was ringing. Not a hunter phone; just his. That was a relief, as he was pretty sure he wasn't awake enough to pretend to be an FBI agent. "Yeah?"

"Bobby? It's Warren."

"Oh, hey." Warren – Officer Paul Warren – was a local cop, but he knew what he was, and occasionally let him know when there might be a case he should look into. And all because Bobby once saved him from a werewolf attack. Apparently he needed to go around saving the entire department from monster attacks so they wouldn't just think he was a delusional old drunk. "I'm gonna guess you're not just calling to shoot the shit."

"Wish I was." He sighed heavily before he dove into what he had to say. "Remember the Hicks case?"

That made Bobby suck in a breath as if punched. Bastard motherfucker child killer who plagued about half of this state and a neighboring one. Bobby figured out he was possessed by a demon, but had to sneak in an exorcism as part of a manhunt that ran the guy, Hicks, to ground. He exorcised the demon, but the guy died anyway. He killed eight kids that they knew of, and was suspected in five other disapperances. That was ugly in more ways than one. He brutalized those kids, and killed them in gruesome – cannibalistic-ways. Just about every cop who worked the case needed intensive therapy afterward, and some of them quit. But it was the ritualized brutality and cannibalism that tipped Bobby that it might be a demon and not a person. An especially sadistic demon. "Believe me, I've tried to drink that one away, but it hasn't worked so far."

Warren exhaled a shaky breath, and Bobby had a sudden, sick feeling what he was about to say. "I think he's back. Is that possible? Could he be back?"

His stomach lurched, and he was glad it was fairly empty. "Why d'ya say that?"

"The Crawford boy went missing day before yesterday. We just found him. What's left of him."

Christ no. Why the hell was this happening again?