Disclaimer and warnings see chapter 1

Chapter 4 Tracks

Sam stayed awake as long as he could but his recent head injures were making it harder than normal to keep alert and watching for any sign of Dean or Bobby calling on the CB. Sam was snoozing lightly when Bobby returned and he leaped off the couch, adrenaline pumping his heart faster as he saw the door open and Bobby step through.
"I don't know Sam. No sign of him." Bobby answered Sam's unasked question. "You go up to bed. I will stay down here and keep an eye out. If there is no sign by first light we can both go out again."
"But Bobby..."
"No arguing Sam. I haven't called your Daddy yet, you've noticed so you do as you're told and I will let you help me in the morning. If not you will be here monitoring the CB again. It's too late to be arguing. All we can do if we stay up now is worry so lets get some rest so we are fresh in..." he consulted his watch "...5 hours when its first light."

Sam didn't like it but dragged himself off to bed; worry eating at him about his brother. He couldn't have got lost, he knew the area and had good orienteering skills due to their dads training. So what had happened to him? Was he mad at Sam for the way he had tired of him and sided with Bobby telling him to go walk the dog? Did he have worse injuries than he let on from the last hunt they had been on? Because Sam had been injured Dean would have put his own injuries aside to look after his brother.

He had done it before. Once when Sam had been injured in training by John he had lashed out and taken it out on Dean. Dean had stood and taken it knowing Sam had been hurt. Sam had limped away in pain, whining at his father for putting him through such hard physical work. He had ignored Dean's attempt to render first aid and finally pushing him away when he had persisted. It wasn't utill later when Dean was dressing for bed that he had seen the bruises he had inflicted on his brother did he fell like a spoiled brat and a really bad brother.

He had seen Dean limping earlier today when he was helping Sam before he left to walk Castor. Surely he was okay? Sam took a long time to fall to sleep worrying about his brother and tossed and turned until at last the sky outside his room began to lighten and he could get up and get dressed.

Sam ran downstairs to find Bobby asleep on the couch facing the front door; he didn't look like he had much sleep either. Sam went to the kitchen and put some toast and coffee on for a quick breakfast so they could get going and find his brother. By the time he had the coffee done and the toast ready Bobby came into the room slowly yawning and adjusting his hat. Bobby turned the radio on in the kitchen hoping to get an update on the weather so they knew what they would be walking into. Bobby was unhappy to hear it had been very cold over night and it would start to snow again around noon that day.

They ate in silence, Bobby now as worried about Dean as Sam. He knew they would have to get going early to try to find out what happened before it snowed too much. They both found themselves glancing out the window every few seconds and Bobby noticed Sam glance at the door a few times as well. Once they had finished and shrugged on warm coats Bobby and Sam walked the same way they had last night following where they thought Dean had walked the dog. There was no falling snow this morning and the sun was out for the moment but by the look of the sky it would be snowing again by lunchtime as predicted.

Sam walked slower than he had the previous evening looking for the faintest boot mark of Deans. The early sun had melted the snow enough to find two or three before they got to the walking track. They turned right walking slowly, seeing dog foot prints as well as a few tracks that could have been Dean's. There was no one around which was good as far as looking for tracks but bad for finding any witnesses as to what had happened. After a few minutes Bobby stopped and bent over the motor bike tracks he had seen the night before, he saw definite boot prints standing out in the middle of them. Sam came over for a look and followed the tracks up the side of the dirt wall.

There were some scrape marks like someone had tried to climb the wall, but with the side of their boot? Sam examined the area closely and found paw prints going up the slope pushing dirt back down as it climbed, disturbing the light snow. The dog must have climbed up the slope, but why? The tyre marks were close to where the dogs paw prints went up the slope. Chased by the bike maybe? Sam combed his hands over the turned dirt and snow where the dog had climbed and saw shiny metal. He pulled the metal out from the dirt and found the dogs lead attached to it, Castors lead.
"Bobby." Sam called and showed Bobby the lead.
Bobby had been trying to make out what the bike riders had been doing by tracking the tire marks. He had guessed at least three bikes by the tyre marks.
"Castors lead. Where was it Sam?"

Sam showed Bobby where he found the lead and showed him the dogs trail going up the slope.
"So they scared Castor off but what happened to Dean?" Bobby was almost afraid to ask.
Sam examined the ground and scraped away some snow. His breath caught in his throat and his stomach dropped when his fingers came away red. Blood. Damn he hoped it wasn't Dean's blood but the dog wasn't injured when he had returned so it didn't look good. Sam scraped snow away in the direction the blood seemed to go, away to the left. Sam's fingers were going numb as he continued to scrape the light covering of snow as he tracked the blood. It soon got easier to track as there were drag marks now that had been covered in snow but the warmth of this morning was melting it a little now making them slightly easier to make out. But they would be missed if you weren't trained in many forms of tracking like Sam and Bobby. The fact that Dean had trained Sam to track so well didn't escape Sam as he searched.

The scrape marks in the soil were made more visible once the snow was scraped away. The marks were headed toward the forest at the other end of the track. Sam wanted to run but knew he had to be careful and track his brother's movements carefully. He cleared a bigger area of snow bring careful not to disturb the marks underneath, Bobby crouched beside him frowning as more snow was removed. The marks were smooth pushing away gravel and dirt but in places there were sharp lines like the side of a boot had snagged the ground. They were hard to find but luckily over the top of the bike tracks.

Sam stopped further along as he saw a longer sharper indentation in the soil. Sam gulped down a lump in his throat. Dean's belt buckle had made that mark, Sam was sure. Bobby clasped the young mans shoulder as they pieced together what had happened. After a while the marks suddenly stopped and there were different marks, scuff marks from boots and after some more searching amongst the snow, a few running boot marks. It looked like Dean had tried to gain his feet but further along there were more drag marks. Bobby and Sam worked slowly down the track trying not to miss any boot marks or scrape marks getting very cold hands from the snow in the process. At one stage Sam could have sworn he saw a hand print but it was hard to tell as it was very hard to see in the dirt, gravel, bike tracks and snow. Bobby looked at Sam and saw the kid had come to the same conclusion that he had.

Dean had been attacked by the motor bike riders and dragged away.

TBC