'Rise and shine, Sammy!'

Sam jerked awake, sitting bolt upright in bed, breathing heavily as though he'd just run a great distance as he tried to disentangle himself from the twisted bedclothes. Blinking away the last traces of sleep from his eyes, he saw his brother sitting on the threadbare sofa, tapping away at a laptop balanced precariously on his knees. My laptop, Sam noted with a faint hint of irritation. Any other time he would have made some crack about Dean using his computer to look up his favourite, uh, unsavoury sites first thing in the morning, but not now. Not today. Truth was, they were running out of time, and both brothers were only too painfully aware of this fact. The Colt was gone, snatched out of their grasp by Bela, even Ruby hadn't shown her face in weeks, and Bobby had no leads on how to get Dean out of his deal. It was like everyone had given up and resigned themselves to the fact that Dean was going to Hell in a matter of months, weeks even. Sam knew he ought to take comfort in, and enjoy, the fact that he was still waking up to the sight of his brother because, in the blink of an eye, all this would be gone unless he came up with a way to fix it. But this morning, something was different, something was off. Not with Dean, but with Sam. He shut his eyes tight, trying to remember it something untoward had happened the night before. And then it struck him; the dream...

'You planning on staying in bed all day, Sam?' Dean smirked.

He never used to be much of an early riser, that was always Sammy's gig when they were kids, but things were different now. All things considered, he wasn't sleeping too well lately. Instead, he'd wake up at all kinds of impossible hours and while away the time reading Dad's journal for the hundredth time, or looking up potential cases. Anything to keep his mind off the inevitable. He let Sam sleep on though; no sense in them both sitting up and the kid was worried enough about this whole thing during his waking hours without disturbing his sleep too. Even still, Dean had his limits, and 8am or not, he needed his breakfast.

'Sam? Come on, dude, shake a leg. I'm practically wasting away over here.'

When his brother seemed intent on delaying breakfast for as long as humanly possible, Dean sighed loudly, all for Sam's benefit of course, and made a show of pointedly setting the laptop aside. When he finally got a good look at his little brother, however, all thoughts of joking and messing around flew instantly from his mind. Sam looked terrible, pale with dark circles under his eyes like he'd been the one awake all night, though Dean knew he'd gotten a solid seven hours, if not more.

'Hey, Sam, you ok?' Dean asked, frowning slightly.

'I - what?' Sam said by way of reply, clearly distracted as he ran his hands through his long, overlong in Dean's opinion, hair. 'Did you say something?'

Dean's frown deepened. 'Uh, yeah,' he said. 'I asked if you were ok. Man, someone definitely isn't firing on all cylinders this morning.'

'I'm fine,' Sam insisted, though he remained where he was, sitting bolt upright and making no attempt at movement.

'Yeah, 'cause you look just peachy,' Dean scoffed. 'Seriously, Sam, you aren't hungover, are you? We only had, like, two beers last night. Now I've always said you couldn't hold your liquor, but even for you-'

'This isn't a hangover,' Sam muttered irritably.

'Well then, up and at 'em. I found us a case and I want to get some breakfast before we hit the road.'

'Yeah, breakfast, yeah. Sounds good.'

'Sam?'

'Yeah?'

'You planning on getting out of this bed for this good sounding breakfast? I can't see a classy joint like this doing room service, somehow.'

'What?'

'Seriously, Sam, what's going on with you?' Dean asked, coming to sit on his own bed, facing his, clearly very disturbed, brother. 'Are you feeling ok?'

Sam raised his head to look at Dean. 'I'm ok, I guess, I just had a strange dream and it weirded me out. That's all.'

Dean rolled his eyes. Of course Sam would get his panties in a twist over some stupid dream. He stood up and was halfway into his leather jacket, ready to go for breakfast with or without Sam, when the obvious suddenly occurred to him. He was back by Sam's side in an instant. 'Wait - a dream? Not like, not like one of your dreams? I thought all that psychic crap stopped when Yellow Eyes bit the dust?'

Sam actually smiled at that, or at least stopped grimacing for a second. 'Nah, you're right. It was just a dream. Vivid though.'

'Ok then.' Dean stood up and pulled his other arm through the sleeve of his jacket in another failed attempt to rally Sam to action. Recognising defeat, however, he sat back down, sighing loudly as he abandoned all attempts at patience. 'What, Sam, you want to write about it in your dream journal, huh?'

'Shut up, Dean.'

'No seriously, if it freaked you out that much, then tell me about it.'

'Seriously?' Sam raised an incredulous eyebrow.

'Quicker you get started, quicker you get finished, quicker we can get breakfast. I'm thinking the diner down the street we went to yesterday. You know, the one with the great pancakes and the waitress with the really big-'

'Yeah, ok, I get the picture,' Sam cut in quickly before Dean could launch into a long tirade. Once he got started on his passions, namely food and women, there'd be no stopping him. 'Ok, so in this dream, it was like I was me, but I wasn't me, like I was living somebody else's life, you know?'

'No,' Dean answered truthfully. 'But go on. What was so weird about it?'

'Just how vivid it was. It was like I really was there, being this guy, living his life or whatever.'

'So you were like some Bizarro World Sam Winchester, is that it?' Dean asked lightly, attempting to inject some humour into the situation before Sam freaked out completely.

'That's the thing, it wasn't me,' Sam replied, looking almost sheepish for some reason. 'In this dream, or whatever, I was called...' he trailed off, looking distinctly embarrassed now.

'Did you dream you were a chick?' Dean grinned. 'It's ok, you can tell me, Samantha, I won't judge.'

Sam didn't even bother to reply, but carried on like Dean hadn't spoken. 'In this dream, it was like I was some guy named, uh, Dean.'

Dean didn't even try to hold in his laughter. 'So even in your dreams, you wish you could be me?' he smirked.

'No,' Sam shot back at once. 'I wasn't you. I was some other guy called Dean. Dean Foster, or Forrester. Something like that.'

'And what did this Dean guy get up to?'

'Would you stop smiling at me like that? I didn't dream that I was you, ok?'

'Fine. What did you dream about then?'

'Well, he, I, whatever, was just this ordinary kid. He went to school, and played hockey in some small town.'

'So not a hunter?'

'Definitely not a hunter. I think I, he, worked in like a grocery store or something.'

'Sounds interesting. I mean, grocery stores and hockey games? Riveting stuff, Sam, really.'

Sam, apparently, didn't see the humour in this. 'Shut up, Dean, it's not like I can control what I dream about, right?'

Dean held up his hands in a gesture of mock surrender. 'Hey, no need to get all defensive, dude, I'm just saying. Where there any chicks to liven up this dream?' He couldn't control his grin when Sam looked embarrassed again and immediately averted his gaze. 'You've been holding out on me, Sammy! You didn't tell me it was one of those dreams.'

'It wasn't one of those dreams,' Sam scowled, despite the embarrassed flush now blazing his face.

'So did this Dean guy have a hot cheerleader on the sidelines of his hockey games?' Dean grinned, clearly enjoying himself. 'You know, with one of those little skirts, waving her pompoms in the air-'

'She wasn't like that!' Sam snapped, surprising both Dean and himself with the sharpness of his tone.

'Jeez, Sam, lighten up. It was only a dream, right?' Dean frowned, suddenly not enjoying their little conversation anymore.

'Sorry,' Sam apologised quickly. 'It just felt real. That's all.'

Dean's expression softened somewhat, but he couldn't help retorting, 'Yeah, I know. You've already said, like, ten times.'

Silence fell between the two, before Dean cleared his throat loudly. 'I think I found us a case,' he offered, gesturing towards the abandoned laptop on the sofa.

'Great. Give me the details,' Sam said at once, hoping his enthusiasm didn't sound too feigned.

Glad of an apparent return to normality, Dean went to retrieve the computer and began to read aloud extracts from local news websites. Sam, however, was only half listening. As he swung his legs out of bed and pulled a crumpled shirt on over yesterday's t-shirt, he couldn't stop himself from thinking over the details of the dream. It had all seemed so real. She had seemed so real. He knew Dean would laugh if he said aloud how sweet she had seemed, how funny and quirky and smart she was. In his mind's eye he could see her in a fancy school uniform, in a blue dress for an ill-fated school dance, going off to college to conquer the world. Man, she was smart. She could run rings around him with her eyes closed and all those books she'd read...All at once, Sam came to his senses and internally scolded himself for behaving like some lovesick teenager, all over some girl he'd never even met, some girl who wasn't even real, he corrected himself firmly. No matter how much he'd felt like some forlorn teenager in love, or how real the object of his affections had seemed, it was all a dream. There were far more worrying and pressing concerns at hand than some made up girl he had a dream about. That in mind, he hastily out the dream out of his head and instead focused his attention entirely on Dean.

Dean, apparently, didn't notice that Sam's mind had been somewhere else entirely, but he'd been busy reading out the details of their latest case.

'So we'll grab a bite to eat, hit the road and we'll be there by lunchtime,' he finished, closing the laptop. 'It's close enough, just a couple of hours drive.'

'We're staying in Connecticut?' Sam asked. 'You've been wanting to leave since the second we got here.'

'Believe me, it's not my first choice. If I had a say, then every supernatural son of a bitch would be haunting Vegas and we'd never have to leave, but seeing as we're in the neighbourhood, can't hurt to have a look, right?'

'If you say so,' Sam shrugged, beginning to stuff his clothes from the day before into his duffel.

'Yeah, well, I do say so. Now get a move on, I'm starved.'

As like most mornings these days, Sam was filled with the overwhelming feeling that there was more they could be, should be doing. They should be looking for the Colt, tracking down Bela, anything that might get Dean out of his deal, not helping another nameless, thankless town from a ghost problem. He opened his mouth to voice these concerns as he did every morning, but Dean, sensing what he was about to say, intercepted him before Sam could get even a word out.

'Sam, we've been over this,' he said, patiently enough, but there was a kind of firm insistence to his voice that signalled the end of discussion.

'But, Dean-' Sam tried again, but he was hastily cut off.

'But nothing,' Dean said firmly. 'I know you don't like it. Hell, I don't like it much myself, but what else can we do? We don't know where Bela is, and since that bitch took the Colt with her, then that leaves us pretty much out of options, right?'

'We're going to get you out of this, Dean.' Sam said, his voice suddenly infused with a confidence he certainly didn't feel. 'I mean it.'

'Yeah,' Dean said lightly, giving a casual shrug. 'Maybe. But not today. Today we're paying the good people of Stars Hollow a little visit to see if we can't sort out the trouble they're having. Kapesh?'

Sam made some kind of response as he zipped up his bag and slung it over his shoulder, casting a quick eye round the room to make sure he hadn't left anything behind which, of course, he hadn't. They'd been in and out of enough motel rooms over the years, and made an impressive number of quick night time escapes, in order to make both of them masters of the quick pack-and-go. He left Dean to check them out and waited by the car. Maybe he was still a little preoccupied, or maybe Dean was right and he really wasn't firing on all cylinders, but he slid into the passenger seat as usual, like Dean hadn't mentioned anything unusual. It wasn't until Dean slid his favourite cassette tape in and pulled out of the motel parking lot that it finally clicked in Sam's mind.

'What's the place we're going to?' he asked slowly.

'Huh?' Dean asked over the deafening din now blaring from the speakers. 'You say something?'

Sam shut off the stereo with one deft motion, ignoring Dean's outraged expression and cry of, 'Dude! You know the house rules!'

'Never mind that,' Sam said sternly. 'Where are we going?'

'I already told you,' Dean muttered irritably. 'Some small town in Connecticut, remember? I don't remember the name, just that it was something stupid.'

'Stars Hollow?' Sam suggested quietly.

'Got in one, Sammy!' Taking a sideways glance at Sam's suddenly horrified expression, and completely misunderstanding it, he added, 'I know, man. Told you it was some stupid name. I don't know what it is with these small towns. Would it kill them to have a normal name that doesn't make you want to puke when you hear it?'

'That's where my dream happened,' Sam said in a low voice. 'That's where I dreamt that I, that Dean guy, lived.'

Dean frowned slightly, but when he spoke, his voice was surprisingly light and calm. 'Really? Huh. Some coincidence, right?'

'You think this is just a coincidence?' Sam burst out, both his frustration and his temper rising. 'I have a dream about this place, the most real, vivid dream I've ever had by the way, and then you just happen to find us a case there? You don't think that's just a little weird?'

'Yeah, I think it's weird,' Dean cut in quickly. 'But, Sam, you need to calm-'

'What if it's a trap?' Sam asked, his mind now racing in a hundred different directions as he tried to formulate a theory. 'What if, I don't know, my psychic stuff's coming back and I'm having visions again? What if this is something to do with Yellow Eyes?'

'The Yellow Eyed Demon is dead,' Dean said firmly. 'I shot that son of a bitch myself. And you remember what Dad said - the Colt kills anything. Yellow Eyes is dead. End of story.'

'Well, something's going on here,' Sam insisted, 'and I intend to find out what.'

'Sam, listen, this isn't an important case, alright? It's just some spook causing trouble, a pissed off spirit, or a poltergeist at the very most, no big deal. I only suggested it because we were nearby. The news report said that nobody had even gotten hurt, a couple of locals just got a scare, so there's no rush. I can make some calls, get some other hunters to sort it out, and we can go on someplace else.'

'We can't just leave, Dean!' Sam said incredulously. 'We have to check this out. Period.'

Dean rolled his eyes. 'Fine,' he said at last. 'Fine! We'll check it out, but the second something weird comes up concerning you and your weirdo dreams, then we're out. Understand?'

'Understood,' Sam said quickly. 'But something's going on, Dean, I can feel it.'

'Whatever,' Dean shrugged. 'Now, if it's alright with you, we're going to get some breakfast.'

'I'm not hungry,' Sam said truthfully; now that it seemed the events of his dream were coming to life in a way, he suddenly felt too nervous and anxious to entertain even the thought of food. And, anxious as he was to see just what the hell was going on, he couldn't deny that there was a little shred of excitement hidden in there too. It had been a damn good dream, for the most part at least.

'Course you're not,' Dean muttered.

'But I'll wait for you,' Sam offered. 'You can go ahead, I don't mind.'

Dean actually laughed at that one. 'Please. How could I enjoy my food with you staring at me and checking the clock every two seconds? I guess I'll just grab something there.'

'Thanks,' Sam smiled. 'I owe you one. The food's on me later.'

'You bet your ass you owe me one,' Dean said gruffly, but he was smiling. 'Can't believe I let you talk me out of breakfast. This Sleepy Hollow place better have some good food, that's all I'm saying.'

'Stars Hollow,' Sam corrected.

'Like it matters,' Dean said, turning on the stereo again, though he kept the volume low, perhaps so that his continuing litany was still perfectly audible. 'Didn't even get my coffee this morning, Sammy. How's a dude supposed to function without coffee, huh?'

Sam raised his eyebrows, unable to suppress a small smile as the events of his dream replayed themselves in his mind. 'Don't worry, man, I'm willing to bet you can find plenty of good coffee in Stars Hollow.'