The Impala cruised through the night, surrounded by the thick, still darkness that fell in the hours just before dawn. Its headlights were the only source of light on the moonless night, casting bright yellow beams across the dull asphalt of the otherwise deserted road. There was a heavy sort of fog hovering about, and the Impala's headlights couldn't totally penetrate it.
Owing partly to the fog, and partly to the fact that his brother was leaning against the car window and snoring lightly, Dean drove more slowly and cautiously than he normally would have. He was leaning back in his seat, his eyes unfocused as he steered the Impala casually with one hand. He glanced at Sam periodically, checking to make sure his brother was sleeping soundly. He was paranoid that Sam could have another fit at any moment, forced to relive his memories of the torture his soul had undergone in Lucifer's Cage. He recalled the way Sam had fallen to the floor, eyes rolling, body twitching as if in seizure when he'd collapsed in the hotel after they'd killed the Arachne. It made him wince to think of it, but Sam appeared quite peaceful, his cheek pressed up against the cool glass of the window and his mouth slightly ajar. His eyes moved under their lids; he was dreaming. "Hope they're sweet dreams, Sammy," he murmured, looking back to the fog-swathed road.
While he was still apprehensive, Dean felt that a hunt away from anything Sam had encountered during his year without a soul that might irritate the 'wall' in his mind was the best thing for them both right now. They would arrive in the Virginia town in less than two hours, probably around sunrise, and this hunt would take Sam's mind and his own off of anything related to Hell and the mysterious Mother that threatened the back of their minds at every moment.
Dean was fairly sure they would be hunting a rugaru. It had been reported that two people had disappeared in the past two days, and the police hadn't discovered corpses - just remains, stripped of flesh. It should be an easy hunt without any moral issues to get tangled up in, Dean thought; the rugaru would already be turned and far past reason if it was snacking on suburbanites, so it would just be a matter of tracking it down and lighting it up like a Christmas tree with a flamethrower. Dean smiled at that idea. He liked flamethrowers.
He heard Sam stirring, making soft noises as he woke. He turned to glance at Sam again, and grinned at his brother's sleepily blinking eyes and mussed-up hair. "Have a nice nap?" he asked good-naturedly. "You conked out pretty good there. Face stuck up against the glass. Drool pouring out the side of your mouth. It was really an awesome sight."
Sam started to frown, but was interrupted by an enormous yawn. When he had finished his yawn and leaned back in his seat, he said rather belatedly, "You're not pretty when you sleep either." He paused, hazel eyes gazing out at the dark road in front of the car. It was too dark and misty to see more than ten yards in front of the Impala, creating a curiously forbidding sensation of isolation on all sides. He returned is gaze to Dean, trying to shake the ominous feeling. "Want me to drive for awhile?" he said, blinking and wiping the last vestiges of sleepiness from his eyes. "You've been driving all night."
"Are you kidding?" Dean said, arching an eyebrow. "I love driving all night. Spending some quality time with my girl." He patted the Impala's steering wheel affectionately.
"Dean, I can tell you're tired," Sam persisted with a small smile. "Let me drive."
"Never," Dean said, despite that he was having difficulty keeping his eyelids from drooping. "I know what I need to stay awake just fine." He grinned broadly and jabbed the radio dial. Metallic rock music blared out of the speakers, and Dean bobbed his head in time with a syncopated rhythm, the sleepiness seemingly totally dispelled. He began to sing along loudly, and Sam shook his head, though he was smiling and beginning to murmur the lyrics under his breath along with his brother.
After a few minutes of raucously blaring music and off-key singing, Dean couldn't mask his exhaustion and quieted, turning down the music just enough to let Sam know that he really was beginning to feel the effects of driving for seven hours straight. "We almost there?" Sam asked, squinting at a green sign that flashed in the headlights. The sign had passed by in a foggy greenish blur before Sam could decipher what it said.
"Yeah. 'Bout an hour and a half to go, probably," Dean said distractedly, frowning slightly. "And all back roads from here on out. Just cruising time, really." He pressed his foot down on the accelerator, and the Impala growled as it picked up speed, scattering the fog that clung to its wheels.
"When we get there, we find a motel and get some sleep," Sam said firmly. The last thing he wanted was for Dean to get into a hunt without resting, as he could tell that Dean would if he wasn't there to stop him. Sam knew his brother was just raring to gank some monsters, to get out some of the worry that was plaguing him. Worry about him, Sam. Worry he didn't deserve or require.
"Fine." Dean turned the music up again, and Sam understood that Dean wasn't feeling particularly talkative at the moment. He turned back toward the passenger window and half-closed his eyes, pretending that he was napping again despite that he had no intention of going back to sleep.
Dean's eyes itched and stung with tiredness, but he gazed fixedly at the road ahead, his hazel-green eyes locked on some unseen goal lost in the blackness outside the car. He wasn't really thinking about where he was going; he seemed to turn the steering wheel by instinct, sensing which way the mist-draped road would twist next. It seemed that the next hour before arriving would pass in relative peace. Dean didn't allow his mind to wander, not wanting to touch on anything dark that might be lurking in his psyche. Instead, he emptied his mind as completely as he could, focusing fully on the words and notes of the music coming from the radio speakers. Sort of like meditation, he thought.
CRASH! THUMP! Dean slammed on the brakes, his eyes wide and his breath coming fast. He'd hit something; he hadn't seen what. He'd just seen a flash of something pale and solid against the windshield before it was gone, flung away from the car. He opened the car door and leaped out before Sam had even reacted, his eyes scanning the dark, unfamiliar terrain for anything unusual. He pulled his gun out of his back pocket, grasping the familiar weapon tightly in his right hand.
Dean heard the other car door slam. Sam appeared at his side, having exited the Impala as well. Dean felt confusion and apprehension setting in; he couldn't see anything out of the ordinary. As it was, he couldn't really see anything, what with the thickness of the dark and the curling, knee-high fog that reached like fingers up his legs. But then Sam touched his arm and said in a quietly urgent voice, "Dean. Look."
Dean looked. There, almost obscured by the blanket of fog, what appeared to be a young woman in a leather jacket and skinny jeans was lying face down on the asphalt, her dark hair falling everywhere about her head. Her limbs were lying at odd angles, and Dean felt his stomach do a sickening, tumbling sort of flip-flop.
Both Winchesters ran to the woman's side at once; Dean kneeled at her right, Sam at her left, and after exchanging a meaningful glance and a grimace, they worked together to carefully turn her over onto her back.
They winced at what they saw. Her face was covered in abrasions from the asphalt of the road that oozed blood, and she had a hideous wound in her neck which appeared horribly as if something had taken a bite out of her. She was pouring blood, and without a great deal of contact both Sam and Dean somehow found their hands coated in it, thick and sleek as red velvet gloves.
She was still alive, somehow, and gasping for breath. She seemed conscious enough, so Dean tried to speak to her while Sam pressed a hand to her neck to try to staunch the bleeding. "What happened?" he said, gruffly yet still as gently as he was able, his eyes searching her vacant, pain-clouded ones.
"You mean before or after you hit me with your car?" the woman said, her voice incredibly clear and managing to carry sarcasm even in her grievous state. Dean's eyes narrowed.
The woman smiled; the black of her pupils melted seamlessly across her irises and scleras like a spreading pool of ink, turning her eyes beetle-black. Dean drew back from her, his jaw set grimly. "What the hell happened, you demon bitch?" he growled, all traces of concern having instantly evaporated from both his voice and his face. "Seems to me like something took a bite out of your meat." He glanced down at the place where her neck was missing a chunk, then looked back into the emotionless black eyes of the demon with unmasked loathing.
"Listen to me, boys," she said, wrapping her arms about herself to steady the convulsions of her dying body. "There's serious shit going down around here, and even though I'd like to see both of your gutted carcasses ripped to pieces, if I were you I'd hightail it back the way you came." She raised her brows at a scowling Dean and added emphatically, "Seriously."
And before Sam or Dean could react, the woman had opened her mouth and pitched forward as black smoke streamed out between her parted lips. When the vile smoke had cleared, leaving a chokingly sulfurous smell in the air, Sam hurried to support the woman as she fell forward with a cry. "Shh," he whispered, laying her down gently. "You're fine." The brothers' eyes met at the moment Sam spoke the lie, and Dean's jaw set grimly.
"I - it was - I can't ..." The woman choked out a few clipped, strangled phrases, but the shock and the blood loss were clearly draining what was left of her life. Her eyes were restored to their original brown now that the demon was gone, but they were glazed with the icy approach of death. "I see ... such a bright light," she muttered hoarsely, turning her head slowly. Her eyes fluttered.
Dean didn't have the heart to tell her that the bright light she saw was nothing more than the Impala's headlights.