Hello, lovelies!
So for how Sam just explodes outside the ranger station... I'm actually writing from experience here. I've felt so angry before that I had to make something hurt before I could calm down. It's not a fun feeling. I tried to describe it as best I could and do it justice, but I'm kind of wary. And if she seems to be just going bonkers between fine and holy-crap-I'm-gonna-kill-you, that's because she is.
Please review! They make me all warm and fuzzy inside.
Yours,
MD
DISCLAIMER: I do not own any part of Supernatural. All credit for the show goes to Eric Kripke and the beautiful writers that thought this up. Bits from the actual episode were taken for accuracy purposes only. Enjoy!
Sam leaned over a three-dimensional map of the park and stared at Black Water Ridge in the ranger station they'd parked at. Dean was slowly walking around, examining all the decorations and pictures on the walls, paying no mind to the map. He stopped in front of a picture of a man and dead grizzly bear and cocked his head to the side, intrigued.
"So Black Water Ridge is pretty remote," Sam informed her disinterested brother, "it's cut off by theses canyons here. Rough terrain, dense forest, abandoned silver and gold mines all over the place. It's the real deal out there, man. This ain't your run-of-the-mill camping terrain it's – "
"Hey, check out the size of this friggin' bear!" Dean interrupted his sister, leaning in and squinting at a ginormous grizzly bear. Sam huffed at her brother's rudeness, but walked over nonetheless. She raised an eyebrow at the picture. Damn. Dean was right. Yogi hadn't just eaten all the picnic baskets, but all the picnickers too.
"And" Sam continued, "a dozen or more grizzlies in the area." Dean looked a little worried at that. It almost made Sam want to laugh. Ghosts and werewolves and wraiths? Eh, not a problem for Dean Winchester. Bears? Apparently a different story.
"You two aren't planning to go out by Black Water Ridge, by any chance?" Dean and Sam turned around at the deep male voice they heard behind them. A park ranger stood in a doorway, taking a sip of something out of his mug. He looked to be in his mid to late fifties, and he had gray hair and gray, washed out eyes. His skin was just beginning to sag with age, but the wrinkles around his eyes spoke of his easy smile and happy nature. Sam didn't miss a beat.
"Oh, no, sir," Sam chirped, flashing him a meek and completely fake smile, "we're environmental-study majors from UC Boulder. Just working on a paper."
Dean grinned at the unmoved ranger. "Recycle, man." The man's eyes narrowed at the two.
"Bull," he accused. Sam's smile dimmed and she nervously glanced over at her brother. He was staring at the man, frozen. Shit. "You're friends with that Haley girl, right?" The ranger scratched at the gray hair under his ball cap before replacing it and walked behind the customer service desk. Sam silently let out a breath she'd been holding in while Dean thought it out for a second and then nodded sharply.
"Yes. Yes we are, Ranger…" Dean squinted at the ranger's nametag momentarily, "Wilkinson."
Wilkinson shook his head and took another sip of what Sam had surmised to be coffee and set his mug down on the wooden desk. The ranger looked up at the pair of siblings, his eyes glinting with something akin to annoyance. Whoever this Haley girl was, she'd done something, that was for sure.
"Well I will tell you exactly what I told her. Her brother filled out a backcountry permit saying he wouldn't be back from Black Water until the 24th. So it's not exactly a missing persons, now, is it? Tell that girl to quit worrying, I'm sure her brother's just fine." Dean nodded, looking appropriately serious as the ranger picked up his coffee mug once more and began meandering back towards his office in the rear of the station. Sam moved to exit the ranger station, but her brother wasn't moving. He had his head cocked to the side in careful thought and soon began speaking again, much to her irritation.
"We will." Dean assured the man. Sam tapped her foot. What was he still doing here? "Well that Haley girl's a real pistol, huh?" Sam gaped at the back of her brother's head. Seriously? Was he fucking kidding? Dean couldn't seriously think that this girl had anything to do with why their dad had sent them here, could he? They weren't supposed to be consoling some girl because she couldn't fucking wait to see her brother. Of course, Sam could understand being worried about a sibling, but dammit if she was just going to sit back while Dean ran around chasing tail. Forget that. She would not stand for that shit. She was here because their father had had a reason for them to be here. They should be out looking for their dad, and if he wasn't here, then out looking for another clue. After shooting something, of course.
Sam felt her anger grow and morph inside her. It roared, begging to be released into her brother's skin. She grinded her teeth instead and balled her fists at her sides and focused on the motion of breathing. Distractions? Yes, please.
"That is putting it mildly." Dean chuckled knowingly and nodded his head. He grinned easily at the ranger and Sam scowled at the back of his head, fuming and crossing her arms. Oh, she had a few choice words for her dear brother, but she'd wait until they were back to the car. She had the common sense to wait for privacy before releasing her anger, at least. That was something… right?
"Actually, you know what would help is if I could show her a copy of that backcountry permit. You know, so she could see her brother's return date." Un-fucking-believable. Sam had seen and hear enough, thank you. She didn't even wait to see if Dean had gotten what he'd wanted, she just stormed out the door and walked around to the side of the ranger station, leaning against the wall of logs. She shoved her hands into her leather jacket and glared at the ground as if she could set it on fire, seething. This girl's shit wasn't their fucking problem. Dean needed to leave well alone and help Sam figure out what the hell they were doing here in the ass-middle of nowhere, not lie his way to an address of someone they had nothing to do with. They needed to find their dad, not find a quick hook-up.
Sam felt an itching in her hand, almost a compulsion that started in her fingers and tingled its way up her arm. Her fingers balled into a fist of their own accord, and before she knew it, she was punching the closest tree as hard as she could. Her hand cried out, but she stamped it down, pummeling the unrelenting trunk over and over. Sam refused to stop. Her anger was so complete that after that one moment of pain, she didn't even feel her hand anymore.
She felt such pure, unbridled rage, such bottomless and endless anger. She knew, somewhere in the back of her logical mind, that she was merely transferring the rage she'd felt and buried the night of the fire on to Dean simply because he was there. She recognized that what he was doing was, honestly, the right thing to do. This Haley girl's brother was up at Black Water, which is exactly where their dad had pointed them. He was either waiting there for them, or there was something supernatural going on. Maybe both. If Haley had some reason to suspect her brother was in danger, and his last known location most likely had a freaky monster wreaking havoc, then they should check up on the family. They should get some knowledge ahead of time before they just went in, guns blazing. But, for all that reason and rationality, it only made Sam angrier. She didn't want to rational and logical about all this crap, she wanted to get what they came for and move the fuck on already. She had never, ever been angry like this at her brother before. Oh, he'd pissed her off, sure, but this urge to rip into his skin was something Sam had never experienced. It was an anger that could not have been appeased by anything other than physical pain. All she felt was that itching, that insatiable need to make something hurt and bleed. There was nothing to make it stop besides seeing the pain of something else. She needed something to cry, something to writhe and roil as she had in her rage, and before she'd even thought about it, she was driving her hand into the rough bark. Her hand had been completely out of her control and acted on its own, mostly because Dean wasn't around to be her punching bag. So, she'd inflicted it on herself. Pain was pain was pain. The source didn't matter, just so long as something hurt.
It took a few seconds for the pain to pierce through that red wall of murderous anger, but once it did, Sam's rationality latched onto it like a lifeline. She stilled her fist mid-punch and warred with her own mind, trying to stamp down the fury before Dean tried to talk to her and got his teeth knocked in. It was so difficult for Sam to throw everything back in that box she'd made for herself, but the pain helped. It was real. It was a feeling, but it wasn't an emotion. It was something she could focus on and give her the strength to ignore everything else. It was the key to keep her from letting her outrage and fury snap her mind like a twig and take charge.
Sam looked down at her hand. It throbbed painfully, and her knuckles felt like they were already swelling up. It didn't feel broken, but it was certainly beaten all to Hell. The skin on a couple of knuckles and fingers was missing, and there was bright red blood dripping down her fingers and onto the damp, brown earth. Already she could see a giant bruise stretching over her knuckles and traveling up her fingers in a dark, ugly purple, contrasting to the sharp red of her bleeding hand. Sam hated the color red. It was so fucking disgusting. It made her dream rush back to her in a frenzy, and memories she'd carefully avoided thinking about thrashed around in her head. The wound on her soul bled fresh, and she gasped. Yes, this was what she'd needed to make her explosive temper stop. She focused on the acute pinpricks all around her chest and mind, the intense burning in her hand. Her fury subsided for the moment, and Sam slumped against a tree, choking on the air passing into her lungs. Tears were already welling up in her eyes. She hastily wiped them out with her good hand and took deep, slow breaths.
Inside her mind, Sam built a prison. Cold, hard, intimidating, and made of steel. Deep inside the prison, there was a room. That room led to another room, and another, and another until finally, she was standing in front of a box. Made of wood, and old, but sturdy. It was in that box within a room within a room within a room within a prison that she stuffed all of her anger and all of her pain and all of the crap that she just couldn't handle. And when that was over with, Sam fled from that prison like her life depended on it and threw so many locks and chains around the doors that she wouldn't be able to open them again. She took a step away from the steel walls, and the memories whispered for her to come back, but the hurt lessened a little bit. She took another step away, and the whispers faded a little this time along with more pain. She kept walking away from that closet, step by step until she didn't feel the heartbreak anymore, and the whispers had died away. When Sam opened her eyes again, all that was left was her hand. No anger, no sadness, no nothing. Just her hand. A feeling, but not an emotion. She could deal with her hand.
Sam pushed herself off from the tree and took a shaky breath, running her left hand over her face. She felt a little nauseous. Heaving a deep sigh and rolling her shoulders, she slowly started walking back to the Impala. When she walked around the corner, she saw Dean leaning against the driver's door, examining a piece of paper in his hand. A copy of the backcountry permit, no doubt. Her anger hissed at her from within her mind, begging to be set free, but she stubbornly ignored it, walking forward. Prison. Nothing could escape the prison.
She was still trying to figure out how to explain her hand and the injuries to Dean when she got up next to him. Sam just let it hang by her side, dripping silently on the ground, and decided she'd let her brother notice on his own time. It gave her time to think of what she'd say, at least. She wouldn't bring it up until he did. Sam leaned over to examine the paper her brother was smirking down at.
This permit had the home address of one Tommy Collins, so that would probably be their first stop when they got to town. Dean's face looked very pleased with himself as he gave the document another once-over and shoved it into his pocket. He rolled his eyes down to meet Sam's and raised an eyebrow at her, his face going from smug to confused. She shifted her hand subtly behind her and stared blankly back at her brother.
"What was that all about?" Sam shrugged, trying to ignore the anger that was bleeding back into her system. Fucking waste of time this girl was. Who gave a shit? They just needed to see what they were here for and then move the fuck on, already. Precious time was ticking away while Sam could be hunting the thing that had…
Sam shut her brain down. Box. Put it all in the box. Thinking was dangerous, so just shove it all in the box and ignore it. Shove it to the back. Don't think. Box it. Box it up.
"I needed air." Dean looked at his sister eyes narrowed in suspicion. His expression was pissing her off. Sam looked away, down to the ground, struggling to tame the demon roiling inside her head. However, her tenuous control was slipping a little, and she couldn't resist the bitterness in her voice in the question she was already asking. "So, what, you cruising for a hookup or something?" Both of Dean's eyebrows raised at this.
"What?" Where had that question come from? Sam hadn't wanted to say that. Well… yes she had. She'd wanted very much to say that, but she didn't want to want to ask her brother that.
"The coordinates point to Black Water Ridge, Dean. I mean, let's just go find Dad. Why even fucking talk to this girl?" Dean stared down at his sister, frowning a little.
"I dunno, maybe we should know what we're walking into before we actually walk into it?" Sammy kicked at a rock with her shoe and shook her head, silent. Talking was dangerous too. She didn't want to start a fight with Dean, there was no telling what was going to make her snap and just go off on him. Her brother was already trying so hard to make her feel better; it wasn't fair for her to expect him to be her emotional punching bag too. So, she just started to walk around to the passenger side, but, as luck would have it, that was exactly when Dean noticed that her hand was injured. His hand shot out and grabbed her upper arm, halting her progress. "Whoa, what the hell happened to your hand?"
Moment of truth. Sam held up her hand, examining it contemplatively. The blood flow had slowed down to almost a stopping point. The gashes on her knuckles were ugly, and they were deep, but they weren't too big. There were a lot of them, but none of them looked all that bad. Her hand was a little swollen and red where it wasn't already dark purple. To Dean, it probably looked pretty horrific, but to Sam it just looked moderately intriguing. Like a science experiment. Sam frowned at herself. That was wrong, that wasn't supposed to be her reaction. Maybe she was shoving too much away in that room.
"Sam, I asked you what the hell happened to your hand." Sam hadn't realized she'd been quiet that long. She dropped her hand back down to her side and gave a half-hearted shrug, gently pulling out of his grasp in the process.
"Anger management." That answer didn't seem to satisfy Dean, if his expression was anything to go by, but Sam didn't care much. She just continued over to her side of the car and opened her door with her good hand, pulling her first aid kit out of her bag and dressing her wounds. By the time she had finished, most of the blood was washed away, the wounds had been cleaned, and her knuckles were wrapped in gauze. The burning sensation hadn't lessened at all, and now her hand just felt sore and stiff on top of it all, but at least she didn't have to worry about infection for the moment. With a flash of regret, she realized that she'd punch with her dominant hand. Well wasn't that just bloody fan-fucking-tastic. Maybe she'd be ambidextrous by the time her right hand had healed.
She got into the car grouchily, upset with her mistake, and waited for Dean to start up the Impala. However, when he sat down next to her, he didn't turn his keys in the ignition like he normally did. He just sat and stared at Sam, his eyes narrow and full of concern.
"What?" She snapped. Dean's eyes silently scrutinized something in her expression, before turning forward and finally starting the car. They drove in silence all the way to Tommy Collins' house, Metallica's 'Master of Puppets' blasting as they pulled away from the ranger's station.
By the time they stopped in front of Tommy's house, Sam was feeling much closer to something like normal, and not the emotional Ping-Pong she'd been between such violent anger and her severe lack of emotions. And her hand fucking hurt. Bitch stung, man. Maybe she shouldn't have used so much force on that tree. Forget extra strength Tylenol, that crap wasn't doing shit. She'd just have to grit her teeth and suffer through it. It was her fault, after all. Besides… sensations were so much easier to manage than those tumultuous emotions.
The two siblings walked up to the door and Dean knocked promptly on the screen door three times. It was just a few seconds before the front door behind the first screen door swung open. A pretty girl, looking to be around 18 with curly black hair that hung at her shoulders and light blue eyes, stared back at the two strangers on her front porch curiously. Dean cocked his trademark grin at her and Sam flashed a quick smile that she hoped looked friendly enough to be believable. Closer to normal, but not there yet. She was prepared to follow Dean on this one and trust his gut was telling him that there was information here, but she still felt a flicker of annoyance at using up so much time to do so.
"You must be Haley Collins. I'm Dean, this is Sam, we're rangers with the park service. Ranger Wilkinson sent us over. We wanted to ask you some questions about your brother, Tommy." The girl looked at Dean, up and down, contemplating something.
"Let me see some ID." Dean whipped out a fake ID he'd stopped to make on the way over here and held it up to the screen. Sam just shoved her hands deeper into her pockets, shifting her weight slightly. She didn't have one, unfortunately. Haley scrutinized the piece of plastic for a few seconds before looking back up at the pair. Dean and Sam smiled again and she nodded, opening the screen door for them. "Come on in."
"Thanks," said Dean. Dean moved to the side and out of the way as the screen opened, and Haley raised an eyebrow when she spotted the Impala behind them. Her eyes roved over the car before they fell on Dean.
"That yours?" Dean looked behind him at the car and grinned, obviously glad to show off. Sam just shook her head internally.
"Yeah." Haley looked impressed and gave Dean a small smile.
"Nice car." Well that would get her brownie points. Dean considered anyone who liked his car to have good tastes, and if it was a woman that had good tastes well… that was a one-night stand just waiting to happen. Haley walked into the house and Dean, not surprising Sam in the least, turned around and smiled wickedly at his sister. She just rolled her eyes and shoved her brother inside the house, shutting the door softly behind her when she stepped in after. They followed Haley into the dining room where a gangly boy of about 15 with short black hair and brown eyes sat down, nervously hunched over his plate. His hands were fidgeting with his silverware, and he pointedly avoided looking at the two strangers. Sam had to smile a little at that. Shy boys were so cute to her.
"So," Sam began as Haley started placing food on the table, "if Tommy's not due back for a while, how do you know something's wrong?"
"He checks in every day by cell. He e-mails, pictures, stupid little videos, but we haven't heard from him in over three days now." Well that was to be expected, Black Water Ridge was no-man's-land. How he even got enough reception to send those things daily in the first place confused Sam.
"Well, maybe he can't get cell reception." Sam thought that should be the obvious answer, but Haley just shook her head.
"He's got a satellite phone too." Ah, well, that explained things. Still… people went camping to 'get away from it all,' and especially in places like Black Water. Maybe he was just enjoying the peace and quiet and the disconnect.
"Could it be he's just having fun and he forgot to check in?" Dean queried. Sam's mouth quirked in amusement. So her brother had been thinking vaguely the same thing then. The boy sitting at the table dropped his silverware and fixed him with a piercing stare.
"He wouldn't do that." His voice was soft, but the earnest conviction was obvious. Dean looked at the boy, seeming surprised that he'd said anything at all. Sam was hesitant to believe the boy; it was too easy to be someone else when people were around. Maybe they didn't really know their brother at all, they only saw a pretty colored facet of who he was.
Haley, previously in the kitchen getting more food for the table, walked back in and set it down on the table, talking patiently with Sam and her brother.
"Our parents are gone. It's just my two brothers and me. We all keep pretty close tabs on each other." And that explained why Haley was worried after only three days. Pieces of the puzzle were starting to click together in Sam's head, and then an idea popped in her head. If something had happened up there, maybe there was something in all those pictures and stupid little videos Tommy had sent to his family. It was a shot in the dark, but it couldn't hurt to find out.
"Can I see the pictures he sent you?" Haley nodded and walked over to the computer at the other end of the room. Sam followed her and sat down in the chair. Haley clicked on a desktop file, and dozens of picture files pulled up. She opened one with a handsome young man, maybe 24 at most, with black hair and light brown eyes smiling and waving. Sam liked his smile. It was an honest smile, it didn't hide anything. There were too many walls and masks in her life these days, it was refreshing to see someone that felt comfortable just being honest about themselves and how they felt.
"This is Tommy." Haley clicked on another one of her brother laughing next to a friend inside their tent. The last one she opened was a video, taken at night, judging by the darkness of the video in comparison to the previous two pictures. Haley clicked play, and Tommy's video began to play.
"Hey Haley. Day six. We're still out near Black Water Ridge. We're fine, keeping safe, so don't worry, okay? Talk to you tomorrow." Sam frowned. She'd seen something on that clip. It was for less than a second, and was more a shadow blipping across the screen, but she had definitely seen it. It had been running across the screen, behind Tommy outside his tent. Sam looked up at her brother and Haley, but their faces didn't prompt the young Hunter to think they'd noticed. Sam turned back to the computer. Perhaps Dean was right, and there was something going on here. But if that was the case, was their dad here waiting to tackle the job with their help? Or had he left this one for them to finish without him, too? If that was the case, then where the hell was he, and why had he skipped town yet again? And why the hell couldn't he pick up his fucking phone and just clue them in on what-the-shit was happening? After what had happened back in Palo Alto, California, Sam figured she deserved answers more than anyone else. The demon inside her hissed mutedly.
"Well," piped up Dean, "we'll find your brother. We're heading up to Black Water Ridge first thing."
"Then maybe I'll see you there." Haley walked past them and back to the dining table to join her brother for dinner. Sam and Dean shared a troubled look with each other before sending it over to Haley. She noticed and sighed. "Look, I can't sit around here anymore, so I hired a guide. I'm gonna head out in the morning, and I'm gonna find Tommy myself." Dean's face softened a little at that.
"I think I know how you feel…" he muttered. Sam's eyes just drifted back to the monitor. That shadow was really bothering her. If she hadn't been specifically looking for something out-of-the-ordinary, she would have missed it. It was that quick. She needed to get these things onto her laptop and examine them more closely.
"Hey, you mind forwarding these to me?" Sam asked, staring at the computer screen.
"Sure," Haley replied. Sam nodded and looked for one moment longer before closing the folder and standing up. She wrote down her email address for Haley on a sticky-note and did her best to ignore the sharp stabs in her hand while she gripped the pen. When that was done, she nodded to Dean and they both thanked the kids for their time as Haley walked them out of the house. Dean glanced at his sister's thoughtful face, walking down the steps to his car.
"You see something, Sammy?"
"I dunno. Maybe. We'll have to wait and see. I wanna go to the library while we wait, though. Poke around a bit." Dean nodded. He'd probably been planning to head there anyways.
When they got in the car, Dean turned on the car and slowly drove away from the house.
"Ya know," he drawled, slowly, "at some point we're going to have to talk about this, Sammy." Sam drew her eyebrows together in confusion. Uhm, what?
"About the case? Isn't that what we were doing already?" Dean gave her a long stare before his eyes settled pointedly on her hand. He looked back up to her and turned forward once more. Sam's face went from confused to empty. Oh. So not that case, then.
"You know exactly what I'm talking about." Sam clenched her teeth, holding the words back in her mouth. She was not going to start this, she was not going to fight. There was nothing to fucking talk about, she was fine. Sam was dealing with her shit the best way she could. She wasn't a liability because of a few damn scratches. And since when did Dean feel the need to get all weepy with her over her feelings? They never talked, about anything. It just wasn't done. It wasn't the Winchester way, and for once in her life, Sam preferred it that way. If he was expecting her to open up and word vomit everything onto him, he was going to be sorely disappointed.
Sam obstinately turned her head away from her brother and looked out the window, refusing to talk. He sighed, but said nothing more on the subject. So much for closer to normal.
Another long chapter. Aha. Sorry about that, but I did give y'all a warning, yeah?
The longer chapters actually mean there's going to be less of them than in Relapse. Just FYI.
Review, review, review, my loverlies!
Peace.
P.S. As a side note... This is going to be my last update for quite a few days. I'm knuckling down to try and find myself a job and figure out the deal with starting school, so I'll be busy for awhile, but fret not my beauties! I won't forget about our lovely SamandDean!