Chapter Two
Summary: Hunting and banter, angst and brotherly love, old friends and new family. Post Season One. No long lost sister. No slash.
Author's Note: There was an article in our local paper about a guy who gathers used frying oil from fast food restaurants and runs his car with it - his exhaust smells like french fries. Thanks to the wonderful, beautiful, fabulous people who reviewed the first chapter, said nice things, put me on alert, and added me to their favorites. Ya'll rock. Enjoy and review. Little bit of darkness in this chapter.
Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended. Really. Kripke, you should be happy your beloved characters are so beloved.
Dean had driven slightly more maniacally than usual on the way down the mountain and they'd taken the two teenage backpackers immediately to the small local clinic. Amazingly, both were alive, if barely.
In a town this small, it didn't take much to have the entire population of 119 souls in an uproar. The sheriff met them as they got out of the Impala, ready to mete out justice for traffic violations – Dean had run the stoplight and had broken the "downtown" speed limit by about 40 miles per hour. By the time Jimmy and Dominic had been laid out inside and the pronouncement of breath and heartbeat had spread through the gathered crowd, the Winchesters were done feeding the sheriff their story.
Parking at the giant-summer-camp-cabin that was their motel, they showered and changed quickly then walked the half block to the local eatery. They were starving, but they also wanted to catch fresh reactions to the attack, and this was the best place to do it in a town without an actual evening "hotspot". Forest Edge, Washington was about the smallest hamlet they'd ever been too – the nearest tavern was a good twenty-odd minutes of unpaved road.
It wasn't until they'd returned to the Like-A-Log Inn ("Sleep Like A Log In Rustic Comfort") late that night that Dean checked his phone.
"Sam, does the name S.R. Bennett sound familiar?"
"Nope – why?" asked Sam without looking up from the laptop.
"Just checking to see who called while we were…busy this afternoon." Dean replied a little sheepishly. Sam looked up and flashed Dean a glower worthy of a gothic lord.
"Seriously bro, that was a bad move. You need to leave that thing in the car –"
"I thought it was on vibrate, Sammy –" Dean interrupted only to be cut off.
"But it wasn't and it could have done some real damage if we'd been in stealth mode! Leave it next time or you could get us killed!" he snapped.
"I get it, alright? 'No phone for you' – what are you? Sammy the Cell Nazi?" Dean barked. "I said I'm sorry, I said it was an accident. Get over it. I'll bring the freakin' phone with me if I want to!"
"Oh you will?" said Sam in his Ice Man voice.
"Yeah." replied Dean the Pit Bull.
They stared at one another and finally Sam gave a shake of his head and turned disdainfully back to the computer. He sighed to himself as he realized he'd become Pesky Preachy Sammy yet again – it was a surefire way to shut down any avenue of communication deeper than a squabble. Dean didn't take correction, period. One day he'd remember that and hopefully his days of losing staring contests with his big brother would be over. Sam worried constantly and told himself often and with irritation that it would have to be enough for both of them since Dean didn't seem to do it at all.
And yet that wasn't true and thus, the problem. Dean kept his fear on the inside and had apparently found a way to convert it, like fast food grease to Volkswagen fuel, into something that gave him power and control. Dean had fear, and sometimes it even looked to Sam as though that river ran darker and deeper than his own. But Dean stepped up regardless and plowed it over – plowed it under, more like – and all his terror blazed the way to glory.
This is what gave the little brother the ability to hunt. He watched his warrior sibling walk right on through the Valley, right on past those Shadows, right on up to Death, and slice its head off. Dean had a choice, and Sam knew it. He could battle for good and save his family and maybe the world, or he could run and let the darkness eat him alive. While Sam couldn't profess that courage himself, he knew Dean had it, and he loved Dean and so in his heart he was reduced to the childhood "I'll do it, if you'll do it".
If given the choice, Sam would never rescue the universe from its fate – he'd wait and hold the ones he loved and let that fate become his own, regardless. Dean wouldn't and that was a difference Dean had never seen and Sam had never let him. He'd tried and tried in his younger days to understand his older brother's secret – to figure out bravery and bravado and killing for the greater good and not just for revenge, and if Dean knew he'd failed to teach his baby brother those things he'd die inside (so Sam would never tell him).
Sam refused to see his father's rage inside himself, nearly all the time. Yet on the Hunt the two of them became fused in a way that scared him. In the heat of melee he became John Winchester and all the revenge in the cosmos wasn't enough to sate the anguish of his broken love. There was no greater good. Only the dead mother that came to him in dreams and the woman, also there, who would have borne his children – ashes, all of them because of him.
So his current plan was to keep on being "Sammy" and if he could hold on long enough, maybe Dean could save him (though he couldn't fathom how), and with no one left to love except his brother… Sam would fight for Dean's cause and hope eventually it would be enough to end this horror, one way or another.
"Sammy. Dude. Earth to Captain College Boy, come in Captain College Boy." Dean poked his brother repeatedly in the back.
"Hey, quit!" said Sam, coming out of his reverie and swatting at Dean.
"Where'd you go? You're not possessed are you? Want me to do some tests – "
"No, jerk. I'm fine. Get off me." Sam said sharply as he cut off Dean's grinning suggestions and nearly overturning the chair, he shook away the hands that had him playfully pinned to the rickety slat-back from behind.
"Sheesh - lighten up!" Dean muttered, raising his hands and taking a step backward. His annoyance turned immediately to concern as Sam sat down again, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.
"Sorry." Mumbled Sam, unmoving.
"It's okay bro – are you alright?"
"Fine Dean, really. Sorry I snapped."
"Are you sure you're okay?" Dean didn't wait for an answer and was to the bathroom and back in barely a stride with a plastic motel-issue cup of tap water. He gently nudged Sam's shoulder and Sam looked up and gave his brother a crooked smile.
"I don't need a glass of water, Dean… I was just distracted and you startled me. No vision, no headache, nothing but a crummy childhood and an absent father." He smiled again and stretched as he stood; knowing the running joke would ratchet down Dean's fretting a couple notches.
"Awww, but you got me, Sammy – and what's a big brother for if not to share a crummy childhood with?" Dean grinned and spread his arms wide like he was looking for a hug he dared Sam to take if he wanted to live another day.
"What was that name you were asking me about?" Sam said casually, shifting the conversation away from himself. Dean's forehead creased and he turned and reached toward the nightstand for his phone.
"S.R. Bennett. Ring any bells?"
"I don't think so…" Sam answered slowly, turning back to the laptop and sitting down again. "Might be someone Dad sent our way."
"Or somebody that someone else is sending our way because Dad won't answer his frickin' phone." Dean grumbled. "You gotta love the man, but it's not like we don't have enough to do without being his answering service." Dean paused and then beamed a little, "We've managed to create a decent following for ourselves actually. It's cool to be preceded by your reputation."
"Yeah," Sam cracked, "and to be known for our fine monster-hunting skills too." At this Dean laughed and raised an eyebrow in appreciation.
"Let me see what I can find. What's the number?"
Dean read it off the phone and spelled the last name as Sam started Google-ing.
"That's a Massachusetts area code, but the number isn't coming up listed in any directories so far. Probably a cell. Let's see…" his voice trailed off.
Dean leaned closer so he could see the screen. Sam was notorious for speaking in half sentences or forgetting to do so altogether when he was doing research. Dean hated waiting for Sam to put it all together and spit it out, and so had learned to compensate by following along. It wasn't that he thought he was smarter than his younger brother – though he'd never admit his pride in Sammy's brains he knew the kid was brilliant – but they approached problems differently. And Dean could read faster, which irked Sam to no end, so looking over his shoulder gave him both quicker access to the information and some amusement of the Aggravated Sammy sort.
"Hey, give me some space." Sam scowled. "Looks like there are about a billion people named S. Bennett in Massachusetts… but I did narrow down the prefix to Berkshire County." He gave Dean a push with his shoulder, and Dean moved a little.
"Check out S.R. in Berkshire – let's see what that gets us. And if it doesn't net much try the U.S. Public Records Index over on – "
"Would you like to sit down and type? 'Cause if you want to, I can just hand this over." Sam pointed to the laptop, his eyes wide and his voice overly cheerful with sarcasm.
"Go ahead." said Dean with a smirk, walking to the bed and spreading himself out on it. "I've been meaning to catch up with my life coach – you're welcome to do the dirty work geek-boy." And with that he lifted the remote from the pillow next to him and hit the power button. In his peripheral vision he saw Sam roll his eyes and turn back to the screen, and he gave himself permission to take a nap with the television as a hedge against the intrusion of Sammy's small talk.