OKAY! I know... I shouldn't start a new story until I finish the last one. This one's been batting around in my head for a while and I hit a wall writing the other one. I will still be working on my "Little Dove" story, but it'll be interspersed with this one. Review, Review, review.
He had one thing on his mind since escaping from that dark, yet pure place. And the second his new found "brother" pulled his soul out of that literally God forsaken place, they embraced and he headed straight for her.
"Stay out of trouble," Dean said gruffly as they hugged briefly. Then they went their separate ways. He knew Dean was heading for his brother. 'Sammy' was all he could talk about in their snippets of free time while they weren't killing the creatures that were coming after them in Purgatory. And Benny equally helped pass the time as they were watching each others' back talking about his little Nicky.
Nicolette LaFitte was his daughter and he wasn't even sure she was still alive. Half vampire, half human, she should have never even been able to have been created. But she was and she was his beautiful baby girl. He and the love of his life, Andrea, a human who knew what he was and loved him anyway had spent several years raising her. She aged much more slowly because of her genes so the terrible twos had actually lasted 5 years. Even with that, he cherished thw little one completely. She and her mother had been the reason he'd discovered a sense of humanity- the reason he'd given up killing and draining humans. And the reason for his demise. His maker had balked at his chosen lifestyle and the fact that Benny had chosen a human over the man he had looked to as a god. His last memory was of his maker taking his toddler girl away saying he'd raise the little miracle correctly before ripping Andrea's throat and announcing that he was going to bleed her dry.
He grieved for the woman he loved, but he'd be damned if he would let the Old Man raise his precious little girl.
No matter how close Dean and Benny had grown while putting complete trust in each other and keeping each other alive while down there, they both shared each others' passion for family, and they were going to find out what happened to them: Dean,his brother, Benny, his daughter. And that's why, when Dean cut open his arm in a small cemetary in Louisiana, they both knew what that they were due to part.
And now that's why Benny felt guilty for calling Dean so soon after that day, so soon after he was reunited with his brother. But Benny was in a bad way and he had no other friends in the world. He'd gone searching for the Old Man, ambushing an old crony named Quentin to find out where his old boss was staying nowadays. But Quentin had a surprise for him- two other vamps.
Benny had honed his power and fighting skills in the 50 years he spent in Purgatory and he'd been able to take them out. Not without sustaining heavy injuries, however. He was lying on a dock bleeding heavily when he pulled out his cell phone and dialed the only number in his phone.
Dean saw the number on his phone and pulled it out furtively, stepping out of the motel room and out of earshot of his brother. "Benny?" he asked, confused, casting a glance back on the room door as if Sam could hear what he said.
"Hey, Dean. You, um – you got a minute? Afraid I messed up, buddy..." Benny said, his voice strained.
Dean's face went hard as he asked what happened. Benny assured him that it wasn't what he thought, that Benny hadn't slipped up and ate a human. He started to describe what had happened.
"I'm sorry. You took on how many? Are you crazy?" Dean asked, incredulous.
"See, the thing is, my legs – they ain't working so good. There's, uh... a fuel barge not too far from here. I'm pretty sure I can make it at a slow crawl. I was kind of hoping maybe I could ask you for one more favor?" Benny said haltingly, between coughs knowing what the answer would be.
Benny came out of the bathroom of the fuel barge freshly washed with clean clothes on, drying his hair with a towel. Dean looked at him, surprised, and remarked on how well he looked in spite of the state that he found him with. "Dude, you were double hamstrung," Dean led.
Benny half smiled and drawled out in his Cajun accent, "Yeah, well, a little rest, a half a cooler full of AB-negative – most wounds short of an amputation will mend up... vampirically speaking. I'll be 100% soon enough."
Dean knew him well enough to know when he wasn't telling him something. "Dude, what's going on?" he asked. "Where's your kid?"
Benny put the cap he loved so much and wore every day in Purgatory on his head and looked at his friend who had just saved his ass. He knew from the way he interacted on the phone that the man's brother didn't have a clue who Benny was and that was how Dean preferred it. He deduced that either Dean had lied to his sibling about why he was in Louisiana or that he had told him nothing. Either way, Benny didn't think it was a good idea for the man to get involved any deeper than he already was.
"Your work here is done, Dean," he said succinctly. "You already saved the day. You know I got my... uh 'deal'... and you got your..." he trailed off. "What do you call it?" he struggled. "Family business."
Dean thought back to all the times Benny had saved his ass in Purgatory and vice versa. They spent over a year together and the man hadn't let him down once. Which was more that he could say for his own blood brother, currently. He met Benny's clearwater blue eyes. "This is family business."
Benny rolled his eyes at the sentimentality of the conversation and set his bag down and began to fill Dean in on the full story. About his history with his maker and how they'd feed at sea on rich yachts that they boarded then buried at sea.
"Vampire pirates? That's what you were? 'Vampirates'?!" Dean asked, his brows raised cynically.
Benny stopped his pacing in the fuel tanker and pursed his lips, considering. "You know, all the years we ran together, I can't believe nobody ever thought of that..."
Dean raised his shoulders in a disbelieving shrug. "What do you mean, that's like... the third thing you say!"
Benny huffed impatiently and continued describing the situation. About what the Maker had done to him and Andrea and how he commandeered his little girl.
"I don't know if she's still alive, but I have to find out. And no matter what, I have to kill him. Before he kills me... again." Benny said, taking off his cap and running a hand through his brown/blonde closely shaven hair.
Dean found a notebook and a few other miscellaneous papers of Quentin's on the table and was leafing through it as Benny continued: "You got a cable bill here. Hmm. Quentin's got the NFL package. Prentiss Island, you hear of it?" he asked, meeting the vamp's gaze again.
Benny closed his eyes and let out a sarcastic chuckle. "Oh yeah."
Dean and Benny used a small motorboat to approach the place. A nice little mansion on the bayou. The Old Man never spared expenses and was used to living without care of expenses. Benny started reminiscing about heir time in Purgatory and asked Dean if he was having trouble with their reality on Earth. Dean cut him off, uncomfortable with his line of questioning.
They entered the old style plantation on a small island in Louisiana and moved through it stealthily. Benny saw something that caught his eye. In spite of Dean urging him to keep moving and moving on himself, Benny picked up a framed photograph on the mantle.
"No, no, no..." he pleaded in his Cajun accent to no one in particular.
"Benny?" he heard a feminine voice say. He turned as Dean hid behind a wall and stopped in his tracks. There she was, tall and elegant, dark hair pinned away from her olive-skinned face, tumbling down her back, her dark eyes looking at him imploringly. She was the woman in the picture, only flesh and blood –right there in front of him.
"Andrea," he breathed her name.
Then he was knocked to the floor as he was hit from behind. Another man came down the stairs behind Andrea and began hitting him as well—and the love of his life merely watched.
From behind the wall, Dean had heard all of this go down. He rolled his eyes at how easily Benny was disarmed by a pair of pretty eyes.
"Idiot," Dean whispered as he wracked his brain for the next move.