A/N: Thank you guest Anonymous for your review! Glad you're excited for this!
Chapter 2
"Okay, thanks, Charlie," Sam said, hanging up just as Dean pulled the Impala up to the curb outside the sheriff's station for Eureka, Oklahoma. "Charlie exhausted the monastery she was looking at," he reported. "But she said there was a museum that just got a recent shipment of some ancient scrolls, so she's headed there to check it out."
Dean put the car in park and turned off the engine. "Doesn't sound very promising."
"Gotta look everywhere, right?" Sam replied. He knew his brother was frustrated with their lack of progress, which wasn't unlike when they'd been desperately trying to find a way to remove the Mark of Cain. They'd eventually solved that; they'd solve this too. And in the meantime, Dean had been right: they had cases to investigate.
They exited the car and headed into the sheriff's office, which was pretty much a single room with two desks, one with a name placard for a deputy, the other for the sheriff. An older woman with sun-weathered skin and sand-colored hair tucked up in a bun was sorting through a filing cabinet, but stopped to look up at their entrance.
"Afternoon," Dean greeted. "Agents Stark and Banner, FBI." He held up his fake creds, as did Sam. "We're here about the death of Mickey Jones."
Sheriff Naples, as her name tag read, arched a dubious brow. "About Mickey? Why?"
"We understand you've been having power outages recently," Sam said, sidestepping her question.
The sheriff folded her arms across her chest. "Well, yeah. But I wouldn't call them power outages. More like every damn lightbulb on a street decided to burn out at the same time."
"And Mickey was out repairing them when he died, correct?" Sam asked.
She narrowed her gaze shrewdly. "Yeah. But there wasn't any sign of foul play. Doc Lane couldn't even find a definitive cause of death. Maybe Mickey just suffered a heart attack or something."
"That didn't show up on an autopsy?" Dean countered.
Sheriff Naples scrutinized them for a beat longer before her expression smoothed in realization. "You boys are here looking for terrorists, aren't ya?"
Sam raised his brows incredulously, then frowned. "Uh, we're not jumping to any conclusions just yet."
"Lights being sabotaged? A few more days of this and I would've started looking at the local kids with vandalism rap sheets, but if the FBI is here…"
"Mind if we take a look at the body?" Dean spoke up, cutting off that line of speculation. For now.
"Sure," the sheriff replied, still eyeing them conspiratorially. She gestured for them to follow as she moved past them, and Sam shot his brother a look over Naples's head. Dean just gave a subtle head shake.
She led them across the street where the funeral home happened to be. The victim's body was laid out on a slab in the prep room, as the small town didn't really have an official morgue.
Sheriff Naples went to the head of the table and drew the covering back, folding it down and exposing only the torso. "Like I said, no obvious signs of trauma. He didn't fall off his ladder. Not even a scratch."
Sam hummed his acknowledgement, and moved closer to examine the body. Sure enough, there weren't any wounds that he could see. It was possible that defensive bruises might show up after a few days, delayed by blood flow stopping upon expiration. But bruises didn't kill.
"You have the coroner's report?" he asked.
"Yeah, just a sec." Sheriff Naples went over to the metal desk and opened one of the drawers. "Here." Her phone started ringing, and she handed Sam the file before excusing herself to take the call outside.
Dean took the opportunity to quickly pull out his EMF reader and wave it over the body. It didn't give off a signal. Sam flipped through the medical report, which wasn't much. The 'coroner' was actually the town doctor, not an official M.E. But things like heart attack, stroke, and brain aneurysm were easy enough to detect, and none of those had caused thirty-five year old Mickey Jones to suddenly drop dead.
Still, if it wasn't a ghost, was there even a case here?
Sam flipped the file closed. "So…"
Dean was staring at the EMF reader in something like disappointment. "Maybe it's been too long. We should go take readings of where the power outages were."
"Yeah, except they weren't power outages. You heard the sheriff, maybe it is teen vandalism."
Dean canted his head dryly. "Really?"
Sam sighed. Dean had really been hoping for an actual case, something to do where they could score a win and feel like they were still doing good out in the world, never mind unleashing the Darkness on it. So Sam could indulge his brother a bit.
The door opened as the sheriff stuck her head back in. "Got a call that the generator at the dam failed. There's also a body."
Dean angled away from the sheriff enough to shoot Sam a smug 'I-told-you-so' look.
Sam's jaw ticked indignantly. Okay, one weird death could be excused; two was quickly approaching a possible pattern.
"Looks like these terrorists are amping up their plans," Sheriff Naples continued.
Sam furrowed his brows as he and Dean moved to follow her back outside. "How serious is the dam failing?"
She cocked her head as though giving it a second thought. "Well, here, not so serious. The river will rise, but the town won't be in danger of flooding. Don't these terrorist types like to do test runs before a big attack, though?" She marched to her SUV and yanked the driver's door open. "You can follow me."
Sam and Dean hurried to the Impala and climbed in, the sheriff apparently eager to get out to the crime scene. And while Sam strongly doubted her terrorist theory, if it meant she kept them involved in the investigation, then they could play along for now.
The small dam was a couple of miles outside of town. Sam shifted in the passenger seat to get a look at the spillway as they drove up. It didn't seem all that affected by the reported power failure. Probably what it meant was that the release mechanism was stuck in its current position, which was letting a moderate but steady surplus stream out. Losing power wasn't the same as losing containment.
A man in a work polo and hard hat was standing just outside the door, apparently waiting for the sheriff. "Nancy," he greeted soberly, flicking a curious look at Sam and Dean.
"Rob," Sheriff Naples nodded. "What happened?"
He shook his head. "I don't know. Keith radioed in that the place had lost power. He was trying to get it back, and then- then he just started screaming."
Sam exchanged a look with Dean. Now this was sounding more and more like their kind of thing.
"Mind showing us?" Dean asked.
Rob looked to the sheriff questioningly.
"They're the feds," she supplied. "We might be looking at a whole big can of worms outside minor streetlight outages."
Sam's jaw tightened. He'd prefer if the sheriff didn't go spreading that theory around, but at least she didn't seem ready to elaborate with a civilian. Just freak him the hell out if the wide-eyed look on his face was anything to go by.
They followed the dam supervisor inside, around some bends and turns among the intricate ducts and pipes, and finally to where a body was sprawled out on the floor, the deputy already standing guard over him. The worker still had his hard hat on, and there were no signs of a struggle. His eyes were frozen open in horror, though.
"Any sign of a weapon?" Sheriff Naples asked the deputy.
"Uh, no. Doesn't look like he was attacked. I mean, there's no blood."
"Maybe the terrorists are working like ninjas, using poison to kill. Quick jab to the neck and boom!" She rammed her fist in the air in imitation of stabbing someone with a syringe.
"Terrorists?" the dam supervisor sputtered.
Sam held up a hand to calm everyone down. "We're not sure what we're dealing with here. And there were no needle marks on Mickey Jones."
"We should look again," Naples declared.
Sam tried not to roll his eyes. He flicked a surreptitious glance over his shoulder as Dean inched closer to the body, and shifted so as to block his brother from everyone's sight as much as he could. When he heard the faint click and whir of the EMF reader, Sam raised his voice louder,
"Anyone got a personal grudge against the victims? Maybe something that happened in a bar fight? Marital disputes? Have there been any other deaths in town in the past year?"
Sheriff Naples was staring at him dubiously. "No, nothing like that."
Dean stepped into their circle, giving Sam a subtle negative with his eyes. Great, still no EMF. But if it wasn't a ghost, what was it? Sam didn't smell any sulfur, either on the first victim or here.
"What about poison gas?" the dam supervisor spoke up, earning startled looks from all of them.
"Come again?" Dean said.
"I spotted some black fog in the woods when I came up here, but I got distracted by finding Keith…well." He gestured helplessly at his coworker. "But that's gotta be toxic, right? Maybe Keith was exposed. And Mickey. No one saw what happened to him."
Black fog? …oh, Sam was getting a bad feeling now.
"Show us," he said.
The dam supervisor led them through a side door that took them out onto the causeway above the dam itself. Rob had to shout over the roaring water as he pointed to a patch of woods a couple of miles out. Sam's stomach lurched as he caught sight of a low-hanging black mass curling down among the trees. It didn't look very big from this distance, maybe covering the span and girth of a semi-truck.
What were the odds…?
Sam shot his brother a tense look, and Dean swallowed hard.
"Anyone else report seeing that?" Sam asked loudly, competing with the spillway.
Sheriff Naples was frowning. "Not that I heard. Is this part of the terrorists' plot?"
The dam supervisor's eyes widened. "Should we be evacuating the town?"
Sam was really close to exploding at the sheriff, especially now that he knew there were no terrorists here, but something potentially way more dangerous. "You know what, we'll contact some colleagues at the National Weather Service about this. In the meantime, let us know when the coroner finishes his report on the latest victim." He hastily gave the sheriff his card, and then he and Dean were pushing their way back down the causeway and inside.
Sam cast one last look over the body as they passed it, trying to imagine whether this black fog could kill, and how. It seemed too much of a coincidence, the murders and the mysterious mist, with no evidence of a ghost or demon being involved.
They climbed into the Impala and Dean immediately started the engine. "So, what are the odds?" he said, voicing Sam's earlier thought.
"I don't know, but it kinda looked like what came out of the Book of the Damned."
Dean turned onto the road to head back, except when he came by the first backroad, he veered onto it—heading toward where they'd seen the fog gathered. Sam knew they'd need to take a closer look, try to figure out what they were dealing with. But that didn't mean he wasn't apprehensive about it.
Dean kept ducking his head to gaze out the side window, searching for the fog, but it didn't seem to have come all the way up to the road. He finally pulled over onto a stretch of dirt. "I think it was around here somewhere."
Sam swallowed hard, and climbed out after his brother. They exchanged a wary look, and then started making their way into the woods. Turned out they didn't even have to go that far.
Sam pulled up short and tapped Dean's shoulder roughly, pointing with his other hand toward the cloud of black fog swirling lazily several yards ahead.
"Okay, then," Dean said after a minute. "Um, how exactly are we supposed to fight friggin' fog?"
Good question. Sam wasn't entirely sure what they were looking at, either. If this was the Darkness, was it just…evil weather? It seemed kind of sedate right now. Like a giant, nebulous caterpillar or something. Was it even sentient?
As they watched, Sam noticed one end of the mist begin to churn more vigorously than the rest. It spilled out from the main body of the cloud, billowing puffs cascading over the ground as it headed straight toward a metal shed Sam hadn't seen initially. With the power lines anchored in and around it, he guessed it was a transformer.
The black fog rolled forward, crashing against the shed like a wave that splashed up and over, swallowing the small building whole. Sparks started flying, and there was an electric buzz that crackled and fizzed before falling silent with a final pop. The woods fell eerily silent as the fog continued to burble over the transformer, almost like it was…chowing down. And as it did, the static cloud trailing out behind it started getting bigger, swelling to the point where it covered several more feet of ground, at least on the side Sam and Dean were standing at. Maybe all the way around, for all they knew.
Sam took a nervous step backward. "Um, let's go."
"Yeah," Dean quickly agreed, and they made a hasty retreat back to the Impala.
Neither of them said anything as they drove back to town. What was there to say? They'd probably found the Darkness—but they still didn't know what it was. Or how to deal with it.
When Dean pulled into town, they found people milling about outside in clusters and gesturing at the buildings. Sam narrowed his gaze, and realized none of the lights were on inside anywhere. Guess that transformer had been important.
"So, first streetlight bulbs," Dean said slowly. "Then the power at the dam. Now the town's whole power grid."
Sam nodded along. Oh boy. "Think it's time we called for backup?"
Dean parked the car, then pulled out his cell. "Yeah." He punched Cas's number, followed by the speaker button.
"Hello, Dean," the angel answered after the first ring. "Have you finished your case?"
"Uh, nope, not even close," he replied. "Actually, me and Sam think we've found the Darkness."
There was a beat of silence on the other end. "What?"
"We haven't found any evidence of a ghost," Sam put in. "No EMF, no sulfur to suggest demon, either. But there's this black fog in the woods, and we just saw it basically eat a transformer. Town's out of power."
"Are you sure it wasn't a demon?" Cas asked, and Sam could just imagine the angel furrowing his brow in confusion back at the bunker.
"It's too big to be a demon, and when it took out the transformer, it grew."
"What would the Darkness be doing eating electricity, anyway?" Dean interjected.
There was another round of silence on Cas's end.
"Well," he finally said thoughtfully. "Darkness is the opposite of light. I suppose it makes sense for it to attack sources of light energy."
Sam grimaced. "So you still haven't found anything on it?"
Cas sighed heavily. "I'm afraid not."
"Okay, so what the hell are we supposed to do here?" Dean asked, frustration starting to make him snippy. "It's fog."
Muffled words sounded in the background, followed by Cas saying, "Yes, that might work."
"What might?" Sam prompted.
"We might be able to trap it in another magical container," he answered. "How big is it?"
Sam exchanged an uncertain look with Dean. "Uh, right now, maybe the size of a house?"
"Ryn and I will find something from the Men of Letters' storage that should work, and then we'll come meet you. In the meantime, I suggest you avoid a confrontation with it. And try to prevent it from consuming any more electricity."
"Oh, so don't confront it, but if it comes near a generator, you want us to what, beat it with a stick?" Dean retorted. But Cas had already hung up. Dean scowled at the phone before dropping it on the dash. "Okay, so now we have to convince a bunch of annoyed townspeople not to use their backup generators. That's gonna go over well."
Sam grimaced. Yeah. "Well, the sheriff's already sold on the terrorist angle. All we have to do is convince her they've potentially been sabotaged, and let her give the order to everyone to keep them turned off."
Dean grumbled under his breath. "Yeah. And I guess we can insist that we're the only two with the proper training to check them all. Take our time. But it's gonna take Cas six hours minimum to get here. That's a long time to stall."
Sam's shoulders sagged slightly under the daunting task. On the bright side, the transformer had to be the last big power source in the area, so even if the Darkness got a hold of a few backup generators, it couldn't get that much bigger…right?
He pushed his door open. "We'd better get started."
