- A Light Left On -
Chapter 2
"Sweet nectar of life,"
Trying to piece together everything that had happened that day Dean pours himself some coffee and piles in the sugar. "Shylah", he keeps whispering the name over and over again, hoping it will make sense the next time. Sitting down in the chair beside Sam's hospital bed, Dean flips through their dad's journal in hopes of finding some kind of spirit that uses hypothermia as a weapon.
"Come on man, you know that's not how it works," Dean mutters to himself, tossing the journal onto the small bedside table. Getting up, he walks to the window and takes in the typical small town scenery: one major road; minimal stores; and city hall smack in the middle of Town Square.
"Just perfect! We're stuck in a non-existing town and Sam's alive because some chick – who happens to know all about us – gave him a necklace." Dean flicks a fly off the window and notices a glint in the reflection of Sam, the mysterious necklace. "Alright, I think it's time I figured all this out," Dean mumbles as he walks over to Sam and unties the necklace.
Flipping it over, Dean rubs some dirt off the back and finds four letters carved into it: K-A-N-E. "Kane? What the hell am I suppose to do with this?" Unsure of what he expected to find, Dean knew he couldn't do much with some random name…there could be thousands of Kane's around the world. "Great, well that helped a lot." Dean tosses the necklace back at Sam and wanders aimlessly over to the window again.
"What helped a lot?" Sam groans as his hand reaches for the necklace sprawled across his chest.
"Sammy, about time little brother. How ya feelin?" Dean pulls the chair closer to the bed and sits down.
"Just peachy. What happened?" Sam takes a look around and recognizes the all too familiar setting of a hospital. "The last thing I remember is seeing that girl in the middle of the room."
"Yeah, the spirit, uh, started glowing and … grabbed hold of you. You started shaking, eyes rolling back in your head – you had a whole Exorcist thing going on. Then you passed out like the little girl that you are. Shylah tied her necklace around you and told me to get you a hospital ASAP." Dean carefully looked Sam over to make sure he was alright.
"Who's Shylah? And why a hospital?" Sam shakes his head in an attempt to rid himself of the grogginess blanketing his body and manages to push himself into a sitting position.
"Shylah's your new girlfriend and the docs treated you for hypothermia. I said you fell into the lake…if you ask me; the people around here aren't the brightest we've met. Especially since I don't think there's a lake anywhere near here." Dean chuckles as he leans back in the chair.
Sam gives the necklace a quick once-over and catches the name on the back. "Kane, what's that mean?"
"I dunno. Figure it's Shylah's last name, but really, what can we do with that?" Dean grabs the journal off the table and begins to lazily flip through it again.
"You said Shylah told you to get to a hospital, right? Did she tell you where to go?" Sam examined the necklace more thoroughly to make sure there wasn't anything else written on it.
"Yeah, so what?" Dean didn't even look up from the journal to answer Sam.
"So, she knew where the hospital was. Which means she's probably from around here. Why don't you try looking at the local census, find the Kane's native to Hope Springs and see if there are any left." Sam swings his legs over the edge of the bed and pulls out his IV.
"Sammy, don't you think you should wait for the doctors?"
"I'm fine. And wait for what? For them to tell me I'm okay and start asking questions that we can't answer?" Sam pushes himself out of the bed and notices the 'eyebrow raise' from Dean confirming his leave-quickly-and-unnoticed plan is the one they're going with. But once Sam stands up, he realizes he can't go anywhere without changing first. "Dean, where are my clothes?"
Dean points to a duffel bag against the wall. Tossing it onto the bed, Sam fishes through and finds some jeans and a t-shirt to throw on. "Come on, I hate hospitals, lets go."
-----
"Alright schoolboy, do your thing." Dean takes a seat in front of the only computer while Sam sits opposite him at a table stacked with local census binders.
"My thing?" Sam raises an eyebrow at Dean's sarcastic remark and begins to open up the town's most recent census findings.
"Your book thing. I'll do the internet thing and together we shall conquer the world. Wait, no. We'll just find some psycho chick that seduced you with a spell; saved your life with a piece of jewellery; and then disappeared with a click of her heels. Right, much more practical." Dean began pulling up newspaper articles to see if there was any mention of a house being haunted, strange deaths, the usual.
An hour passes without any luck from either of them. Dean is almost asleep, reading about some 'hero' who saved a cat stuck up a tree a while back, when Sam tosses a book in his lap. "Guess my book thing pays off, huh? There was a mention of a Kane family about six years ago; one grandfather and a single mom with two kids who settled here for like a year and then disappeared. The mom died within two months and the grandfather three months later."
"That's not disappearing, Sam, that's dying." Knowing Sam's going to tell him all he needs to know anyways, Dean tosses the book on the table without looking at it.
"No, the kids disappeared. No names, no foster care, no living relatives, nothing…until two years ago. One of the kids was checked into a mental hospital one town over. Apparently he's suffering from delusions and being treated for schizophrenia." Sam picks up the book Dean tossed away and places it back with the others, grabbing his jacket along the way.
"So what, we're just going to go to this crazy guy, ask him about his psycho sister and solve the case in a logical and sane way?" Dean is still leaning back in his chair when Sam reaches the door.
"Pretty much." Sam flashes that famous Winchester smile and walks out.
-----
"It's so nice to see some family other than his sister visit. The girl's got good intentions but it always sets him off when she leaves." Dean punched Sam in the shoulder at the nurse's mention of a sister, earning him a frown from Sam as they followed the nurse further down the halls of St. Christopher's Hospital.
"Cousins you said right? I've never heard Connor talk about them, but then again, I don't speak Hebrew." Nurse Molly gives the boys a small smile as she swipes her card and holds open the security doors into the mental patient ward.
"Hebrew, you say?" Dean rolled his eyes already betting on a dead end since neither of the brothers speak Hebrew, at least the modern version of it.
"As far as I can tell, but like I said, I don't speak it. I always figured his family was Jewish and he just learned it at home. But since I'm guessing you boys don't know it then maybe not." She held open another set of doors which lead to a dark, quiet corridor lined on either side with small, white doors.
"Now, I want to warn you boys. Connor is not the same boy that you remember him as. For moments he is, and he's always talking if you just want to listen. But he gets uneasy around strangers and might not remember you at first. So be patient, don't get upset if he's not the Connor you love, and just try to remember that he is in there somewhere. Just not always on the surface." After the typical speech is delivered, Molly swipes her card beside door '117' and pokes her head in, talking to someone inside. A moment later she steps aside to allow the brothers to enter.
Once the door was closed, Dean could tell why people always seemed to get crazier the longer they stayed in these kinds of places. Locked inside a small, white, padded room with a chair and table bolted to the floor. Only one small window, out of reach at the top of one wall, let the slightest amount of day light filter into the dark, depressing room.
There was a boy, about seventeen, sitting against a wall, hugging his knees. Molly had been talking to him when she mentioned that his cousins were here for a visit, also letting the boys know that she's just outside if they need anything.
Dean can tell that this isn't going to get them what they want. The kid's talking to the wall in Arabic - the nurse was wrong – about picking flowers, or at least that is the best Dean can translate.
"Sam, you've got to be kidding. This kid doesn't know anything."
"Really Dean? And I'm sue most schizophrenics speak fluent Arabic and ancient Egyptian." Connor is now talking to the floor in Egyptian about frogs and the weather.
As the brothers start to walk forward, the kid speaks faster and faster, moving further and further away from them along the wall.
"Well, that's great. We can't even get close to the kid to ask him any questions about Shylah and this whole cursed necklace thing. Can we go now?" Dean was already heading toward the door when Connor stopped talking and stood up, looking straight at Dean.
"She's special. Destined to doom, doomed to destiny. Special, very special. You should thank her. Everyone should thank her. Thank her, thank her, thank her, thank her. That's what you should do." Connor is now moving around the room but isn't talking to the brothers anymore, more to himself.
Sam gives Dean the 'told you so' look and moves closer to Conner.
"Connor, my name's Sam and this is my brother Dean. We just want to ask you a few questions about your sister, Shylah." Sam takes a step closer to the trembling boy who is now crouched by the desk. "We just want to know where she is, so I can give back her necklace." Slowly reaching into his pocket, Sam takes the necklace out and holds it up for Connor to see.
Instead of calming him down, the sight of the necklace causes Connor to really lose it. He starts spouting off curses in almost every language Sam knows and starts clawing at the walls, as if trying to get out.
"Way to go, Sammy. Can we leave now before you cause this kid anymore damage." Dean starts backing towards the door when he sees Connor scrambling at the walls.
"No, don't you get it. It's the necklace that did it. We just have to figure out why." Sam takes a few steps closer to Connor.
"Sam! That's a kid there; you can't seriously want to keep this up. Come on, I'm sure if we ask around someone will know who Shylah is. Look at him, you're not getting anything out of the guy, let's go. Now, Sam." Dean was about to forcefully make his brother leave when Connor suddenly reaches out and grabs the necklace away from Sam.
Crawling to the corner, Connor begins rocking back and forth, cradling the necklace in his hands and whispering something to himself.
"Where is she? Where's the Worker? The worker needs her tool. Why did you take her tool? Why did you hurt her? You shouldn't hurt the Worker; she needs to be whole so she can come home. She needs to come home. Leave a light on for her, so she can find her way back. Always leave the light on. Always." Connor still wasn't looking at the boys, but his voice seemed to change as he talked.
"Who's the Worker, Connor? Is Shylah the worker?" Sam crouches in front of Connor, making sure to talk quietly in hopes of not setting him off again.
When Sam mentions Shylah, Connor slowly raises his head until he's looking Sam in the eyes, not blinking, not moving, and barely breathing.
"She needs her tool. She won't be able to find her way home without it." Connor holds the necklace up, looking at it as if it was all he could see.
"Why does she need the necklace, what does it do?" Sam was now sitting on the floor across from Connor, so engrossed in the conversation that he didn't even notice Dean walk up behind him.
"It's her light. It brings her home. Keeps her out of there. No one wants to be there too long, so she works. Always working." Connor was still staring at the necklace, holding it as if afraid to break it.
"Where's there? Where does it bring her home from?" Ever so carefully, Sam inches closer to Connor, hanging on every word.
"Don't know. Can't know. Not suppose to know. They're all dead. I'm not dead so I can't go. Only if you're dead. Not dead. She's dead. But she's alive. Dead and alive so she can go. Dead and alive." Connor brought the necklace against his chest and started rocking again.
Sam gave Dean a helpless look to see if he understood any better. The sceptical look on Dean's face was telling Sam he didn't believe any of it.
"What does the necklace do Connor; how does it bring her home?" Sam was whispering at this point, taking in everything Connor said.
"Power. She needs the power. Family needs the power. Uses the power till it's all gone. Then she can't come back. From sister to sister, daughter to daughter, mother to mother. Always passed down, power to new worker, power to new chosen. But power doesn't last forever. Not for her. Not for them. The next one comes and the power fades. Then she can't come back." Connor drops the necklace with a look of disgust on his face.
"Back from where?"
"From death…"