Two flashlight beams swept the huge, high-ceilinged room: the dusty floor, the big metal saws, the stacks of freshly cut boards. Yellow crime scene tape crisscrossed one large saw. The steel semicircle above the cutting surface flashed in the focused light, its teeth still stained red. Dark drips striped the silver metal.
Sam turned his flashlight away. The scene he and Dean had witnessed here earlier today had been grisly, even by their standards. But it was definitely their kind of thing. One gruesome death at a lumber mill was an accident. Three in two weeks was supernatural.
Sam's light landed on a door. "Hey, Dean. Break room." The brothers headed in.
"What are we looking for, man?" Dean asked. "What part of Stu would still be left here after three months?"
Sam shook his head. They'd salted and burned Stu's bones the night before, but the shift supervisor had been found sawn in half this morning. Obviously, there was something here. They just didn't know what it was. Sam studied his side of the room: plastic folding chairs, two big coffee makers, three vending machines. No personal belongings.
"Anything?" he asked.
"Nada."
They left the room and continued searching. More big blades, more boards, more sawdust. Then Dean called from up ahead. "Sammy. Locker room." That sounded promising.
A row of dingy, beat up, gray lockers lined the far side of the room. Strips of masking tape, curling up on the ends, bore employees' names in black Sharpie. Dean started on the right and worked his way along the row. "Rawlings, O'Dell, Brown, Carter—Bingo." Dean's light illuminated a strip of tape with the name "Barker." He glanced at Sam before opening the locker.
Their two beams fell on nothing. The locker appeared empty. "Oh, come on," Dean growled.
Sam guided his flashlight around the corners of the shelf, then down to the bottom of the locker. "Hey, wait." He bent lower, and spotted a small, dark comb, nearly the same color as the metal. Stuck between its thin teeth and littered around it was what amounted to a small pile of straight black hair. Sam moved aside and motioned for Dean to look.
His brother leaned in, and quickly straightened again, nose wrinkled. "Seriously?"
Sam shrugged. "One of the employees I interviewed said Stu was sort of OCD about combing his hair."
Dean eyed the bottom of the locker. "That's disgusting." Then he pulled the lighter from his pocket and tossed it to Sam. "I call not it."
Sam caught the lighter reflexively. "Dean, how is that—"
"Not it." Dean had already turned his back and started for the door.
Sam sighed. He crouched down, and after a moment's hesitation, started sweeping the hairs into a pile with his fingers. He brushed the pile and the comb out onto the floor, then flicked the lighter open.
Its low flame illuminated a well-worn pair of work boots that hadn't been there a moment before. Sam looked up to see a large, sallow, black-haired man in overalls with a patch bearing the name "Stu." His right leg was black with blood, and nearly severed at the thigh. Next instant, the ghost planted a boot in Sam's chest. His lungs flattened with an oof as he flew backwards and crashed into a wall.
"Sam!" Dean fired the sawed-off from the doorway, but the ghost had already vanished. "Lighter!" Dean shouted.
Sam sucked in a breath of air, did his best to sit up straight, then held up his hands to examine them. The flashlight was still in his left, but his right was empty. He shook his head at Dean.
Dean came toward him, searching the floor with his own flashlight. Sam got up to help, gritting his teeth at the pain in his back. "There," Dean said, and bent to grab the lighter. He turned back toward the comb and mound of hair.
Stu rematerialized and backhanded Dean, launching him about ten feet sideways. He skidded across the floor until his head smashed into the door frame. He didn't get up.
Sam rushed toward Dean, toward the shotgun, toward the lighter. Cold hands clamped down on his shoulders and yanked him back. This time he slammed into metal; a locker cratered behind his head and shoulders before he fell to the floor. Slumped forward, he saw Stu's work boots walk away from him across the spinning, tilting floor. A moment later, he watched through patchy black clouds as Dean's limp legs and feet slid through the doorway and out of sight.
He squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his hands to the sides of his head. His brain still rattled around inside his skull. He opened his eyes again. The room wobbled around him, but he pushed himself to his feet. He staggered toward the door, searching the floor for the lighter, the only way to end this.
A loud, mechanical whine split the quiet.
Oh, God, no.
Lighter forgotten, Sam sprinted toward the noise. It squealed louder in the big, open area. He spotted Stu on the other side of the room, hoisting Dean by the armpits up onto a cutting surface. Sam pounded toward them. "Dean!"
Dean lifted his head and opened his eyes. He glanced behind his head at the noise, and his eyes flew wide; their whites shone in the dim room. He mouthed, "Son of a bitch"—Sam read his lips, but couldn't hear his voice over the scream of the saw. Dean kicked at Stu, grabbed him by the wrists, tried to wrench free, but the ghost barely budged. White hands hauled Dean across the table, toward the spinning saw blade. On his back, Dean fought and wrestled, but the vengeful spirit was stronger. It dragged him closer and closer. His head was now inches from the deadly blade.
Sam pounded toward them, arms outstretched. But he wasn't going to make it. "No!"
Just as the spinning blade reached Dean's hair, Stu paused. He looked down at his boots. Flames exploded up from his feet, and engulfed him. The ghost let out a furious cry as the fire intensified, condensed, consumed him. With a final blazing burst of heat, it vanished. Stu was gone.
Sam slowed down, panting, too relieved to wonder how it had happened. He caught Dean by the arm as his brother slid off the table. "You okay?"
Dean cupped a hand around his ear. "Huh?"
Sam searched around the table until he found a switch, and flipped it. The screaming saw slowed and stopped. He put a hand on Dean's shoulder. "You okay?"
Dean touched the top of his head, where he'd slammed into the door frame, and winced. "I'm fine." He gestured at the spot where the ghost had stood moments before. "What the hell happened? What took him so long to burn after you lit the hair?"
Sam shook his head. "Dean, I didn't…"
The door to the locker room burst open. A woman with a dark ponytail ran toward them. She clutched Dean's lighter in one hand, and the half-melted, smoldering comb in the other. Sam felt Dean stiffen at his side.
Ruthie stopped in front of them. A shaft of moonlight illuminated anxious brown eyes, a tipped-up nose, and just a hint of freckles. She scanned each of them head to toe, then exhaled. "Thank God."
"What part of 'stay in the car' don't you understand?" Dean growled.
She flinched, but then her eyes flashed, and her chin tipped up at a defiant angle. "I guess the part where you die if I do."
"We had it under control."
She shot a skeptical look at Sam. He gave her an apologetic shrug. He wasn't going to get dragged into another one of their arguments right now.
Dean jabbed a finger at Ruthie. "Next time, you're staying at the motel. Or better yet, the bunker." He marched off toward the exit.
She glared at his back, then loudly asked Sam, "Is he always this ungrateful?"
Dean didn't break stride.
Sam patted her on the back. "Yeah, pretty much." He followed Dean, and after a moment, Ruthie's light footsteps trotted behind him.
She fell into step beside him, and handed him the lighter. "He won't really make me stay behind next time, will he?" She glanced ahead at Dean's resolute form, her face strained. "I can't take much more of the bunker, Sam. A few days alone now and then are fine, but…"
"Not weeks at a time?"
She looked up at him with a pained expression, and shook her head.
Sam remembered what it felt like to be left behind, left alone, while Dad and Dean went off hunting. The boredom, the restlessness, the suffocating quiet that no radio or television could fill. The gnawing conviction that while they were doing important, heroic work, he was utterly useless. It was why he'd taken Ruthie's side and talked Dean into letting her come along on their last several hunts.
"Even waiting in the motel, not knowing…" Ruthie's voice tightened and trailed off.
Sam remembered that feeling, too. More than the loneliness, more than the uselessness, he remembered the waiting. The seed of dread that lay dormant while Dad and Dean were with him had always sprouted as soon as they drove away. Each hour they were gone, it had grown inside him, sending down roots, spreading out tendrils that wound around his heart and squeezed. The relentless rustle of its dark leaves whispered that this time, they weren't coming back.
He put an arm around Ruthie's shoulders. "I know."
She leaned against him as they made their way between the saws and piles of lumber. "I know I promised to stay in the car, but when I heard the shotgun—" Ruthie stared ahead, watching Dean disappear through the door. "I couldn't just sit there, Sam. I couldn't stand it."
"Dean's lucky you didn't."
"Try telling him that." She let out a short, bitter laugh. "I actually thought he'd be proud of me."
A twinge of empathy plucked at Sam's chest. Yet another feeling he could relate to: wanting to make his big brother proud. "He is, even if he never says it. He just wants to keep you safe."
She took a deep breath. "I know. But the past several months have taught me that there are more important things in life than always being safe."
Sam squeezed her shoulder. "Let him cool off. I'll talk to him later, after we're back home."
"Thanks, Sam."
They stepped out into the chilly, early spring night. The Impala idled in the parking lot, waiting for them.
Dean stuck his head out the window. "Let's go. I need a drink."
Sam and Ruthie climbed in. "Sounds good to me," Sam said. His muscles hadn't relaxed since Dean's close call.
"Guess I'm the designated driver, then," Ruthie said.
Sam shot a sideways look at his brother, silently instructing him not to shoot her down too hard. But to his amazement, Dean gave her a single nod in the rearview, then pulled out of the parking lot.
Sam stifled a grin. If Dean was willing to let Ruthie drive his Baby, then his tantrum inside had all been a bluff. She was a card-carrying member of the Circle of Trust now. Sam leaned back in his seat. He already knew how it would go: Dean would fuss and stomp his feet for show, make some empty threats, and Ruthie would continue to travel with them on hunts.
Until they iced that wolf, anyway. If it ever showed itself again. Sam frowned. The absence of any clues about the werewolf who'd threatened them nagged at him. They should have found something by now.
He ran a hand through his hair and pushed the lone wolf from his mind. He'd worked enough for one night.