Setting: Pre Season one. Sam is seventeen. Dean twenty one.
Story outline: During a hunt, Dean is kidnapped. Can Sam save him? Can Dean save himself?
Warning for torture in some chapters.
Not a death fiction.
Author's notes: Unrelated to any other of my stories.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural related. Most towns and other people are made up, any similarity to the living or dead are purely coincidental.
Many thanks to CorieHall for the beta on this story.
'This indicates someone's thoughts'
Déjà vu
Chapter 1 The beginning of all things
Sam Winchester woke with a start jackknifing up in bed in the middle of the night. The coolness of the night made him shiver and pull the blanket back up to his bare chest on instinct. That's when he knew what was wrong. Without even looking, he could tell his older brother was absent from the bed they had to share. His brother's heat was missing. Dean threw out heat like a small sun when he slept which was nice in winter but not so nice in summer, in Florida. Sam stood slowly deciding since he was up he would use the bathroom then track Dean down. Just in case.
'Yeah, like he needs me to protect him.' Sam thought.
Sam hadn't seen much of Dean for the past week. Dean and John were working a hunt John had deemed too dangerous for Sam. Sam would normally complain that he was sixteen and almost as tall as Dean now but if shutting up stopped him having to hunt, he was shutting up.
Sam did what he needed to do in the bathroom and walked into the softly lit kitchen. There weren't that many rooms in the small house to search his brother out. They had the small house because their dad had been invited down by a friend of Bobby's to do this hunt. It wasn't much but for the past week it was a home to them. Sam found Dean sitting at the small kitchen table with a map out in front of him, a cloth and several paper clippings. A lamp on the bench behind him was the only light in the room. Sam came in the few steps to the table and noticed Dean had his feet up on one chair as he rubbed something hidden in another cloth he was holding. Like Sam, Dean had no shirt on due to the warm Florida night. It was so dark in the room Sam couldn't see much of Dean's chest just his face.
Sam came up beside Dean and put his hands on the back of the unoccupied chair.
"Hey Dean. You okay?"
"Yeah Sammy. Just coolin' down a bit. Want a drink?" Dean nudged a glass with clear liquid and condensation next to his hand.
"Not if that's…"
"Easy Sammy, it's just water."
Dean slipped out of his chair to go the two steps to the fridge as Sam pulled out the chair he was touching and sat down relishing the coolness on the back of his thighs. Sam immediately looked at what Dean had laid out on the table squinting at the map in the low light.
'How the hell is he reading this?'
Dean carefully placed a glass of frigid water close to Sam on the table away from the maps and papers and slipped back into his seat putting his feet his feet up slowly on the other chair.
"Thanks. I thought you guys had figured this one out?"
Sam sipped the refreshing water.
"We have, it's a Quanlier."
"So why are you here and not out gankin' it?"
Sam searched his brother's face, seeing how pale and tired he looked. The opposite of what he was seeing in the mirror at the moment. Where Sam was spending his days strolling down to the beach enjoying himself, Dean had been sleeping from being up all night in the everglades or up to his neck in research. He thought Dean even looked a little green around the gills like he was sick.
"We have a wild dog trap coming in the morning. It had to have some of the steel wires replaced with copper or there would be no stopping the thing."
"Can't you just shot it?"
"That's the idea, but once we have it contained. They can reach speeds of up to 300 miles per hour Sammy. Makes 'em a little hard to hit in the open."
"So what, you trap it then shoot it? Won't bullets go through?"
"Finally you've got your game face on. I've made some copper arrowheads and I've also made the shafts out of solid copper because the method of kill is copper to the heart." Dean nudged the cloth on the table with the back of his hand as he took a sip from his glass.
Sam pushed the cloth back a little and carefully picked up one of the arrowheads, tipping it back to the lamplight to see the bright color gleam back at him. Dean had obviously used a mold and poured the metal himself as they were very sharp looking smooth broad-head points with a wider head than he had seen before. Sam could tell Dean had used a grindstone to get the edges to a sharp lethality. Sam saw that Dean had made screw in points for the shafts with a tap and die.
"Nice work."
They looked evil and powerful even in the low light of the kitchen. Sam was glad he wasn't a Quanlier right now.
"And before your giant brain clicks in, I checked. They fit through the holes in the cage."
'It's weird how well we know each other.' Sam thought.
"How many do you have?"
Dean pulled back the cloth back more to show a double row of shining metal against the slightly lighter cloth.
"Twenty. But we should only need one." Dean grinned at Sam but Sam's brow crinkled in worry.
Sam was concerned at how his brother looked and knew it wasn't just lack of sun. He could swear Dean was sweating more than he should be.
"Dean are you okay? I mean what are you doing up at …." Sam looked at the plastic clock yellow with age above the door "…three am? Do you have something on your mind or are you sick?"
'There the only two things that keep Dean up at night. Besides my nightmares and hunting of course.'
Dean looked at Sam like he was seeing him for the first time.
"Don't worry little brother, just go back to bed."
Sam looked away from Dean for a moment wondering if there was something up with his sibling. As his eyes roamed over the bench under the lamp he saw a bottle of Jack's sitting there, well under half full. He was sure it was full earlier and if Dean hadn't drank it...?
"Dean, what's going on?"
Sam looked pointedly at the bottle on the bench then back at Dean.
Dean sighed heavily putting down the arrowhead he had been polishing in the cloth in his hand then put his head in his hand with an elbow on the table.
"Nothing, Sammy."
"I am gonna ask again Dean and I want an answer. Do you have something on your mind or are you sick?"
Dean sighed again but gave a half nod before turning away slightly and pulling the map closer. Sam knew Dean was trying to dismiss him but he wasn't having it even at three in the morning.
"It's the hunt right? What's wrong?" Sam had lowered his voice to persuade Dean into talking to him. "Is something wrong with the hunt ?"
Dean looked back at Sam with his palm covering his chin.
"It doesn't matter Sammy. Go back to bed."
"Something's up and dad won't listen right?" Sam guessed.
Dean's eyes widened slightly. "How did you do that?"
"We've known each other so long I know when something is up. What is it? What's the problem with the hunt?"
TBC
For anyone wanting to know this story is finshed and ready to post so no long delays between chapters-Gett