The Phantom Lovers of Dismal Swamp
It's A Swamp Thing by Bird2K
Day 2: A Hair-Brained Plan
"So that's the plan then? You spent all day yesterday geeking out in the library and that's the best you can come up with?"
Sam looked at his brother; sprawled on the bed, sniffing and glaring through red rimmed eyes as if he were somehow the wronged party. Just freakin' typical.
"Exactly Dean. I spent all day at the library researching. What did you manage to achieve? You 'helped' me for all of 20 minutes before you got bored and wandered off. Honestly, you make the average 2 year old look focused and patient."
"I did not 'wander off'..."
Dean aimed for indignant but ended up sounding like he was auditioning for the part of 'blocked up guy' in the next Sudafed commercial. He carried on, regardless.
"...I was pursuing a separate line of inquiry."
Sam made a noise not dissimilar to that of a horse about to throw it's rider: a kind of harrumphing whinny.
"With the jail-bait blonde stacking the shelves?"
"Just tryin' to get a little local perspective on the case, Sammy. Besides, she was 18 and a college geek. Hardly my type."
"Oh, you have a type now? Beyond female and bendy?"
A slight smirk squeezed its way briefly past Dean's bad mood only to crash and burn moments later in a fit of violent sneezing. Screw Sam and his holier than thou attitude! Ok, so he had skipped out on the book learning for something more practical with a perky blonde. But she was a perky blonde who just happened to be a History Major at the local college, and what she didn't know about the Lake Drummond legend wasn't worth knowing. She had shown him around the town, pointing out some relevant places of interest and it had all been perfectly innocent. She was 18 for god's sake! Besides, much as he hated to admit it, this cold he seemed to be coming down with didn't exactly put him in the mood for anything else.
He snapped irritably,
"Look, what's your problem? I just spent a bit of time interviewing a potential witness for background research. We do it all the time."
"No, you do it all the time. I spend hours on the laptop or in the library whilst you amble around 'interviewing' attractive women."
"It's called playing to your strengths, Sam: you work your angle..."
He dismissed the open laptop and pile of dusty books with a wave of his hand.
"...and I work mine."
So saying, he indicated himself with a double handed gesture up and down his body.
"And, Dude, I do NOT amble. It's more a laid back swagger."
Sam huffed out a sigh, mentally counted to 10 and tried to guide the conversation train back on track.
"So, did you get any pertinent intel? And I am emphasizing the word pertinent there, Dean. Only you were gone most of the afternoon and all evening, so I'm assuming she had a lot to say."
"Oh she was chatty alright."
Dean didn't want to admit that he had actually parted ways with the girl at about five. His head, which had been aching all day, had felt about ready to explode by then and his eyes and nose were streaming. All in all he was feeling generally crappy and had just wanted to lay down somewhere quietly by himself and enjoy a little peace. He had ended up grabbing some zzzz's in the Impala at a local 'beauty spot'. Waking up at about ten, he had driven immediately back to a very peeved Sam and had gone straight into the shower without explanation. The hot water had eased his aching head and helped to clear his sinuses and he stood under the spray until the temperature cooled. By the time he re-emerged, the lights had been turned off and Sam was lying with his back to the bathroom, either asleep or pretending to be, and Dean had collapsed gratefully into his own bed.
Despite his exhaustion, however, sleep had not come quickly and when it did finally arrive it was broken and not very restful. He put his current ill temper down to tiredness, but that wasn't letting little brother completely off the hook. Sam and his freakin' superior attitude: maybe he needed reminding who was the eldest here!
It was at this point that he realised he had been directing a glare that would do justice to the grimmest reaper this whole time at Sam, who was beginning to shift uneasily from foot to foot.
Relenting just the tiniest bit, Dean continued more calmly.
"Look, she just showed me around town and gave me a bit more information about our dead couple. Seems like your research was pretty accurate. Everyone hereabouts knows all about Nancy and Neil and their ill-fated rendezvous in Lake Drummond."
The sentence was punctuated with a series of wet sneezes and Sam watched in mild concern as the older man groped around on the bed. Finally he found the toilet roll he had presumably taken from the bathroom some time during the night and attempted to stop the constant drip of his nose.
"You alright, Man?"
Dean glowered as best he could with tissue plugging his nostrils.
"Oh, I'm freakin' marvelous Sammy. Now, do you want to go over this sterling plan of yours one more time?"
Sam tried to reel in his exasperation as he looked at his brother. He was clearly suffering and past experience told the younger man that Dean would not appreciate this being pointed out. If there were some kind of award for turning physical suffering into snark, Dean would be a sure thing to win it. But for all the 'Sensitive Sam' taunts thrown at him, he could be surprisingly thick skinned at times and he decided to push it, anyway.
"You look like crap, Dude. Seriously, what's wrong?"
"You mean apart from having my gigantaur little brother all up in my face first thing in the morning..."
"It's nearly midday."
"Whatever, I haven't had any coffee yet, that makes it first thing to me."
Dean continued; he was on a roll and, despite his sore throat, it felt surprisingly good to vent.
"And he's giving me shit about my working practices when he spent the whole day 'researching' and couldn't come up with anything better than some lame ass, sissy plan that involves binding ghosts with love spells. We don't bring spooks together, Sam! This isn't Blind freakin' Date for the deceased! Or…Night of the Lovin Dead! We send 'em packing to wherever the hell it is the freakin' undead go when they realise they are, in fact, just freakin' dead!"
He paused, wheezing in a breath and trying not to cough up a lung. Dammnit he did feel like crap but he so wasn't gonna admit that, especially not over a stupid cold. Besides, in his experience nothing in the world worked as well as the healing properties of sarcasm.
Unimpressed, Sam asked with exaggerated patience,
"You done?"
Another wheezy sigh and a couple more wet sneezes and Dean admitted gruffly,
"Yeah. For now."
"So, do you want me to go over the plan again?"
"Go on then. Maybe it'll sound less crazy second time around."
Sam sighed. He doubted it.
"Ok. If the stories are to be believed, then this couple has been harmlessly haunting the lake for 130 years. So, the thought is that it's the separation of the ghostly couple that's causing the recent drownings, right?"
Dean looked unimpressed, but nodded.
"We can't do our usual salt and burn cos Nancy was buried in an unmarked grave somewhere on the edge of the swamp and we don't know where Neil's bones ended up."
"Yeah, I get that. But surely there's another way of getting rid of Nancy's spirit: a cleansing ritual or something? I'm just not real comfortable with playing match maker to the lonely and undead."
"Cleansing rituals are notoriously unreliable in these situations. We would still need a personal object from each of the deceased and then we would have to work out the exact location to perform it. Look, I've run this past Bobby and he agrees. If the spirits were harmless before they were split up, then re-uniting them and making sure they can stay that way, is the best long term solution."
Dean rubbed at his itchy eyes, then said with a small smirk,
"Fiends Reunited? Heh, maybe we could start a website..."
"They're not fiends, Dean. I don't think Nancy's trying to hurt anybody. She's just lonely and desperate. She doesn't understand what she's doing."
Dean raised a skeptical brow.
"Maybe not, but we do. And what she is doing is killing people, Sam."
Sam sighed and sat down on the opposite bed, facing Dean.
"I know. And that's why we have to stop her the quickest way we can. I've looked at all the options, Dean, and this really seems like the best one."
The older hunter conceded defeat and rubbed tiredly at his gritty eyes as he responded.
"Ok then. So, this ritual...?"
"Right. It's old and pretty obscure but Bobby reckons it should work. We need a personal item from both Neil and Nancy. We then go to the edge of Lake Drummond, draw this symbol on the ground,"
He held up a piece of paper containing a picture of a circle inscribed with, what looked to Dean like, a bunch of squiggles.
"...and place the objects inside it. We then have to chant this litany..."
He indicated a second piece of paper decorated with his tidy penmanship.
"...as we light them on fire and keep repeating it until the fire burns out. This should permanently bind the couple together, thus preventing this from happening again."
"And by permanently, you mean...?"
"For eternity."
"Well, lets hope that they never fall out then."
"Yeah. That'd suck."
Sam half-grinned and Dean took this as the peace offering it was meant to be. Sitting up, he wiped his hands wearily over his face and tried to reel in his defensive snark for the sake of getting this thing over and done with.
"Alright then, given that the loving couple have been dead for over a century, where are we gonna get a personal possession from?"
"I've looked into that, too. The items will need to be pretty combustible as we're basically gonna be burning them on a campfire. So, I figured, paper; as in photos or books."
"Wait a minute, College Boy wants to do some book burning? Isn't that against some kind of Geek Association work ethic, or something?"
Expecting an eye roll or at least a heavy sigh, he was surprised when Sam merely replied mildly,
"Yeah well, needs must as the Devil drives, Dean. I'm sure my fellow geeks will forgive me."
Almost against his will, he found his full lips turning up in a smile to meet the dimpled grin of his brother and his bad mood lifted slightly.
"Yeah, I'll write you a note or something, like I used to do for Phys Ed at school. Explain that you're a full blooded nerd really but these are extenuating circumstances."
"Gonna need me to spell that for ya?"
His answer was a pillow wrapped around his head, and he laughed as he threw it back. Getting back to the business in hand, he continued,
"Ok, well Neil's book is no problem. Apparently he came from quite an influential family, owned a lot of land hereabouts. He kept a journal and it's been preserved at the museum in town as part of their 'local heritage' display."
"Crazy dude kept a diary? Sounds fascinating. Maybe it'll have some bush tucker recipes in for us to try out. What about Miss Firefly?"
"That's a bit more complicated. No diary or anything on display but she does still have one living relative. Her sister's great, great..."
He waved a big hand in a gesture to convey etcetera,
"...granddaughter. She lives in the retirement home in town. I figure that maybe she'll have inherited something, even if it's just a picture or letter. Worse case scenario, we could use a lock of the living relative's hair. It's not ideal, but Bobby said it should work."
"Hang on, we may have to give Granny Firefly a haircut? And you don't think she might notice?"
"That's only if there's nothing else. Like I said; it's less than ideal. Hopefully she'll have an old love letter or something."
"Yeah, well, I hope so too cos I ain't playing Edward Scissorhands for anyone."
Sam ignored him and continued to rattle off the battle plan.
"Ok, so today we need to scope out the museum, check it's security measures and work out how we'll get around them. We also need to get in to see Mrs Turner..."
"Who?"
"Granny Firefly"
Sam grit his teeth at Dean's smirk but continued.
"We need to get in to see Mrs Turner and try and find out if she has any family heirlooms lying around."
"Preferably flammable ones."
"Yep."
Dean gave a thoughtful sigh, which wheezed into a hoarse cough and left him wincing from the pain in his throat and grasping his aching head.
"Maybe we should stop by a drug store first..."
At Dean's pointed glare, Sam hastily backtracked.
"Or not. Listen, I'll go get some coffee, whilst you get yourself dressed. Then we can head out, grab something to eat and get this all over with."
Bristling at Sam's authoritarian tone, Dean snarked,
"Don't get carried away there, Samantha, remember who's in charge here."
Sam frowned and replied,
"I thought it was a partnership."
Dean's bark of laughter turned quickly into another wheezing/wincing/head clutching fit. Once he had recovered sufficiently he managed to croak out,
"Dream on, little brother!"
Sam just shook his head, got up off his bed and stalked out of the room. Leaving Dean still holding his head, nose full of tissue and staring sullenly down at his bare feet, as he curled his toes into the grubby carpet.
Chapter Ends
