Something was digging into his ankle, something cold and unforgiving. Dean opened his eyes and when the world came into focus he saw water stained, yellowed with age, acoustical ceiling tiles in the soft glow of the light emanating like a halo from behind his head. He didn't remember checking into what had to be the crappiest motel in an inordinately long line of progressively crappy motels.

The room spun and his head throbbed unmercifully when he sat up and he had to fight the urge to retch. He had been put in a bed and covered by a thin; thread bare, pale blue, cotton blanket. Trying to get the rest of the way up and out of the bed, Dean found that his left ankle was handcuffed, footcuffed really, to the rolled stainless steel bed frame. "What the fuck?" he asked under his breath.

Soft snoring sounded to his left and he turned his head cautiously and saw some sort of county cop dozing in a chair next to the door of what he now knew could only be a hospital room. The sounds and smells assaulted him dredging up old, unwanted memories and he reached out with his good hand to try and pull the bedside stand closer in search of his flask. The wheels of the tray hit the frame of the bed and knocked a shiny metal pitcher filled with tepid water onto the floor.

Startled awake, his shoes and pant leg soaked, the deputy blinked sleepily and sat up straighter in his chair and watched as Dean laid back onto his pillow. "Well, well, Sleeping Beauty's finally awake," he yawned sarcastically.

"Bite me," Dean said under his breath and reached up to scratch the unbearable itch at his hairline. A thousand points of pain danced across his scalp when his fingers raked across a good number of stitches. He pressed down and felt the ridges in his scalp, crusted over but still tender to the touch.

Pleased with the confusion in Dean Winchester's eyes and the dumbfounded look on his battered face, the deputy stooped to pick up the pitcher and placed it back on the tray. He then stepped to the foot of the bed and pulled up on the handcuff chain to be sure his prisoner was still secured.

"They have poles that are made to break away but we just haven't got the money to replace the old fashioned wooden ones out on the highway, he started, "You know the ones where the pieces come flyin' up at ya at supersonic speed, usually right through your windshield. You were lucky it didn't hit you square in that pretty face of yours."

If a pole hadn't hit him square in the face than what had? Dean rubbed his jaw gingerly and licked his swollen and split lower lip. He picked up the pitcher, looked at his distorted reflection in it and seeing the bruises and the insanity of his present situation, he started to chuckle half-heartedly. A white-hot band of pain squeezed his ribcage and cut short his laughter.

Stonily, Dean looked to the deputy for answers and the overweight, over the hill and over the top Barney Fife just shrugged his broad shoulders and said with a self-satisfied grin, "Resistin' arrest."

Looking down at his hands, Dean extended his fingers. There were no cuts or bruises nor was there any blood on his cast. He ran his tongue over a cut on the inside of his mouth and was positive there was no way had he'd resisted arrest, not without doing some damage of his own. He wanted to say as much to Barney but the deputy started to drone on about 'them boys up at the South Facility' and how they were 'gonna just eat him up'.

What the fuck was a South Facility? And who were the boys? And where was his flask?

Dean wanted answers and Deputy Dog was more than happy to tell him that the South Facility was a prison and that, even if he did end up in the Intensive Treatment Unit, the boys were the inmates who were going to make him their bitch. He also mentioned that his flask had been impounded, along with his car.

"Oh, Fuck!"

"Oh, fuck is right," the deputy concurred, "We made a quick inventory of your trunk and can't decide if you're a terrorist, a homicidal priest, a ninja or just a gun nut."

"I've got permits for all of them."

"Bullshit. Beside the knives, the throwing stars and the machete, for Christ's sake, what you've got is a couple of illegal sawed off shotguns and a shit load of hand guns, most of 'em with the serial numbers filed off," the deputy told him. He then started to laugh and wanted to know, "And what's with all them salt rounds? You gonna teach some ducks a lesson 'stead a killing 'em?"

"Is that it?" Dean asked peevishly thinking that handcuffing him to the bed was a tad overkill for a signpost killer.

But that was not it by a long shot. The sadistic bastard had saved the best for last and was overjoyed to tell Dean Winchester that his alcohol level had been three times the legal limit and that the little boy he'd hit with his car had died at the scene.

Dean's stomach twisted into a sickening knot and white dots shown before his eyes and he thought for a moment that he might pass out. What little boy? He closed his eyes and, as if on cue, a face danced before him in the darkness. It was the face of a boy about eight years old dressed in a dark hoodie. It was the same boy who had run out onto the highway in front of the Impala. But he had swerved to miss him. That was why he'd hit the pole. It was either screw up the Impala or hit the kid and as much as he loved the Chevy, he'd naturally gone for the signpost.

"He came outta nowhere, man. He ran right in front of me but I swerved. I missed him," Dean insisted. The last of his declaration was almost a question as his memory faltered for a split second but then he insisted, "I missed that kid." He knew in his heart that he'd swerved in time but he had been drunk, drowning his sorrows in Glenfiddich, all the way from Lisa's house to...

"Hey dude, where am I anyway?" Dean asked and the deputy snorted contemptuously.

"That's deputy Fullbright, dickhead and you're in Rock Springs, Wyoming. The last place a drunken, kid killin', son of a bitch like you wants to be."