Once Sam came completely back to reality, he found himself on the floor of their room at the B&B, half in Dean's lap and clinging onto his shirt like a lifeline. He could hear his own breath rushing in his ears with his heartbeat, and felt himself swaying gently from side to side. Dean's arms were around him, one around his shoulders holding the side of him against Dean's chest, and the other holding his head against his shoulder, and he was rocking him slowly, talking to him softly in a mantra he was only now truly hearing.

"Gotta come back, Sammy. Come back, now, okay? You gotta come back. You're okay, I promise. I promise, Sammy, please. Gotta come back now..."

Dean felt it when Sam took his first deep breath in since all of this started, and he squeezed him a little tighter, partly to encourage him, partly out of relief.

Sam took great comfort in the smell of his brother. Which was weird, but at the same time, not really. Dean smelled like the Impala, which essentially was their home. The one thing, besides each other, that was always there at the end of the day. And that was...for all intents and purposes, comforting.

For the most part, the fear he'd felt before was gone. There was maybe a little tingle in the distance, like when a pain killer knocks out most of the pain, but you can still feel it sitting there on the edge. Or like when you're driving right on the edge of the farthest range of a radio station, and it's all static and faint voices. But Sam was back to himself, for the most part. He was, however, slightly afraid to move. The pain he'd felt earlier was overwhelming, and now that he didn't feel it, part of him thought maybe it was because Dean was there holding him, and if he moved away, it would come back. He didn't want it to come back...

"Sam?" Dean's voice was forced calm, but Sam could hear the anxiety laced in it.

"Dean..."

"Geezus, Sammy... Scared the hell outta me," he said in a rush; a sigh of relief coupled with an immediate relaxing of muscles he'd had clenched so tight since picking Sam up off that White House floor.

"We're at the room?" he asked, not moving and not letting go of his brother.

"Yeah, kiddo. Had to get you outta there," Dean told him, absentmindedly rubbing a hand up and down Sam's arm. "Something about that place... Sam, you remember what happened?"

"Did you kill it?" Sam asked, fist clenching a handful of Dean's shirt.

"Kill what?" Dean asked. "Hell, Sam, I have no idea what happened. You started flipping your shit and I lost it. I couldn't find anything. I dragged you outta there and hauled ass back here. I woulda kept on going if I knew what the hell was going on here. But you scared me half to death. Didn't know if leaving would make it worse or what..."

"Demon," Sam told him, weakly pushing away enough to meet his eyes.

Dean met them with question, brushing Sam's disheveled hair out of his face. "You saw a demon?" he asked.

Sam's mouth twitched in a frown and he shook his head for a moment before changing it to a nod. And with a rushing out of a breath he didn't know he'd been holding, said, "It attacked me...him," he corrected. "It attacked the kid. Hurt him bad. Think it killed him. Think it might've been what killed all those kids. They're all trapped here, and-"

"Whoa, hold up, Sam," Dean put a hand on Sam's shoulder. "You gotta bring me up to speed, 'cause I have no damn idea what happened back there, and clearly you have some idea." Sam nodded and sniffled and looked around the room for a moment. "Let's get you off the floor first, okay? You thirsty? You're probably thirsty. Come on," he said as he pushed up to stand and then helped Sam up, leading him to sit on the edge of the bed before Dean fetched a bottle of water from the mini-fridge.

"It raped them," Sam's voice shook as he spoke, and Dean looked over at his profile, at Sam's chin as it quivered slightly as he spoke. "The kids," he continued. "It beat them and raped them and killed them."

"Sam..." Dean took the few steps to get to his brother's side and sat down gently beside him, handing him the water after unscrewing the cap.

"Remember the smell, before we went to the house?"

"The sandalwood and marshmallows?"

"Yeah," Sam replied, shaking his head slightly. "There're books stating how certain mixtures of herbs and roots, including those two, could possibly trap a spirit. I think the demon has been using it to keep them here; bind them to that school somehow. Like...like their own personal little hell on earth."

Dean shook his head, still not completely understanding. "Why kill people, though? Why kill the excavator dude? And why did...whatever happened to you back there...why that?"

"I think...I think maybe they were trying to...communicate or something," Sam guessed, shrugging. "Like they were trying to tell me what the monster was."

"And they had to do it by hurting you?" Dean scoffed.

"They told me the only way they could. They don't know what he is. I don't think they do, anyway. The demon... They just knew his face. Maybe it was the only way they could tell me; making me experience one of their deaths." His eyes shifted in the air in front of him for a moment.

Dean sat there silently observing his brother for a moment as he thought about what he'd said. "So uh... the stuff the spirit showed you... This is kinda like the nightmare you had, isn't it?"

Sam looked at him, then. "Um...sort of," he replied. "The fear was kinda the same, but this was so much more intense. It wasn't just me experiencing this kid's death. It was like...every part of me was the kid. The way I felt in my head, the pain...everything. I couldn't control how I felt, and I didn't have any strength of my own to fight back with. I didn't even know who I was, for a while. I could...I could hear your voice, but I didn't have any idea who you were." That made Dean flinch. "I wasn't me anymore, for however long we were in that house."

"Okay why you?" Dean asked as he pushed off the bed. "Why did it do this to you and not me, huh?"

"I dunno, Dean. Maybe...maybe the trials opened up something for them..." Sam pushed to stand up, cautiously taking note of any aches or pains he might have from the ordeal, but finding none. "Maybe a lot of things. You know that sometimes things happen to me and it ends up being because of the demon blood thing or...you know, whatever. It's not completely off the table. And then again...maybe I wasn't the only one it affected."

"The hell do you mean?"

"The guy that got killed," Sam replied. "Maybe it was communicating with him."

"Oh that's real awesome," Dean nodded with a sarcastic smile. "So now these echoes can kill you? Great. I vote for lets torch and burn the whole damn property and then get the hell outta this godforsaken place."

"No, Dean," Sam shook his head. "I don't think the spirits can do much of anything but give the visions."

"That's some powerful mojo, Sam. I dunno..."

"They've been there for a century," Sam countered. "Trapped in one spot. They would've had to figure out how to get help without leaving. It's why I had the dream. It's like they're sending out a radio signal to whoever can hear it, but there aren't many who can."

"And you just happen to be one who can," Dean tilted his head, brows furrowed in frustration.

"Is it really so hard to believe?"

Dean thought about that for a moment. "If they can only show you things, then what killed that guy?"

"From what I saw in that house," Sam looked to his brother, "I think the demon is still in town. Like he's here just for kicks still, and that excavating team is a threat to his playground... The guy must've figured something out, or maybe even saw what the spirits were trying to show him, and the demon happened to be there. Took him out."

"So we've gotta somehow find this demon, or lure him in, and gank him," Dean stated.

"For starters," Sam replied. "Then we need to find the alter or whatever he's been using, and destroy it."

"And what about the kids? I mean...their ghosts, rather."

"Theoretically, they'll cross over or whatever, once they're free."

"How do we know none of them would be vengeful?"

"They might be. Except that we're exacting their revenge for them, so in essence, their unfinished business would be done with."

"This ain't Ghost Whisperer, Sam," Dean sighed. "They don't always go by logic."

"Well, Dean, so far they haven't actually hurt anyone-"

"Depends on how you look at it," Dean interjected.

"They're just trapped. They don't wanna be here. They just wanna leave."

"Leave and go where?" Dean argued. "What if they leave and decide to go after the people that sent them to that place to begin with, huh? Their descendants or whatever. What then?"

"Well then I guess we'll have to come back and start burning bones," Sam replied. "And hopefully they'll all be dug up by then and it'll be a hell of a lot easier than it would be if we tried to start now."

After a few moments of conflicted thought, Dean grumbled an agreement and turned to sit at the little table in their room. "In the morning," he added. "No way we're going back there tonight."

"Yeah," Sam agreed with a small smile. "I need to get on my computer anyway. See if I can dig anything up about this guy..."

*~.~*

"Sometimes I really wonder about people's ability to observe what's right in front of their faces," Sam said a bit angrily as Dean walked in with coffee from downstairs, the next morning. He was seated at the table and now turning his computer so that Dean could see the screen full of information he'd found since the previous night.

"What'd you find?" Dean asked as he sank down into the chair Sam pulled over beside him.

"School staff photographs leading all the way back to the first year it was open. Look at the warden, Dean," he pointed at the screen.

"Okay," Dean looked at the sightly heavy-set man with brown, slicked-down hair and an almost comically curly mustache.

"There's a picture every year. He's in every one," Sam told him. "This is 1993," Sam showed him the photo.

Dean looked again. "Okay, that's the same dude," he said. "And he looks awfully good for being over a century old."

"Changed his hair and shaved, but it's him. He's...he's the one that h-hurt those kids," Sam's slight stutter caused Dean to turn his head to look at him. Sam was looking at the man with personal fear and disgust.

Dean put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "We're gonna get this asshole, okay? We're lucky he hasn't moved on to another playground yet. We'll get him and take him down."

"These poor kids, Dean," Sam shook his head. "It's like no one even cared. No one even cared about what happened to them."

"People care now," Dean assured him.

Sam looked over at him. "What if Dad had actually sent you here?" Sam asked almost whispering.

"Then this would've been over a long time ago."

"You'd be dead," Sam countered, face contorting with the thought. "You were a kid, just like them. They were helpless, and you wouldn't have had anyone to back you up. You would've died!"

"And Dad would've come and ganked the demon and saved all those other kids," Dean replied with a shrug.

"But you'd be dead," Sam said again. "And all the people we've saved, you and me together, they'd be dead too."

"Oh like you couldn't have saved any of them on your own," Dean scoffed.

"You think I'd be who I am today if you'd died when we were still kids?" Sam's face slackened a bit and Dean looked at him with a raised brow. "Think about it, Dean. If you hadn't been around...hell, I might not have made it outta grade school. And if I had, you think I'd be a good person?"

"Come on, Sammy, we're talking a hypothetical here. It ain't even on the table."

"But really, though. I'm just saying," Sam shrugged. "You always seem to think you don't matter. Like you're not worth as much as me. But if you only knew what kind of person I am...every time you've been dead... You just have no idea how much the good parts of me are there and kept there with you. Without you, Dean, I'm..." he paused and let out a breathy laugh. "I'm not a good person."

"The hell are you talkin' about, Sam?" Dean shook his head incredulously. "You were a productive member of society when you went to Stanford."

"You weren't dead," Sam shook his head slightly.

"You were fine with Amelia," Dean retorted.

"You weren't dead," he repeated. "Or at least...I had no idea," he confessed. "Amelia was...an accident. Before I hit that dog and met her, I have no damn clue...not a single clue what I was doing or where I was going. My head was so screwed up," his face contorted in the memory he was sharing, "Because Crowley wanted me to believe you were dead, but I couldn't... I couldn't believe it. I couldn't accept it, but inside my head, it was like I was torn up in so many pieces that I had no idea what to do. If I hadn't hit that dog...hell, Dean, I might've driven the car off the side of a cliff somewhere. Just to make it all stop."

"And I would've so kicked your ass on so many levels and for so many reasons," Dean narrowed his eyes and shook his head at him.

"I know," Sam replied. "I know that. Once I had to sit still for a bit, and my head had some time to sort things out a little, it's why I didn't take off again. I had to keep going, and I wasn't exactly in my right mind to know any other way than what I did..."

"How'd we get from me dying as a kid, to you defending yourself for the Amelia crap?" Dean asked, slightly confused by the entire conversation to begin with.

"We were talking about how I wouldn't be a good person if you hadn't been in my life," Sam reminded him with raised brows. "If Dad had sent you to this place and you'd died, you think there would've been anything on this planet that would've stopped me from becoming a monster like I was meant to be?" he asked in all seriousness. "You think Dad could've made me be any different?"

Dean swallowed against his dry throat, trying to maintain a straight face, instead of the doom-like feeling in the pit of his stomach at Sam's words. "Dad wouldn't have sent me away, Sam," Dean assured him. "He couldn't have handled you by himself. You'd have killed each other," he gave a small smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.

"That's not my point."

"What is your point?" Dean asked gruffly. "'cause what it sounds like you're tellin' me is that I should believe that Dad not sending me to this school, and all these hundreds of kids' horrific, brutal deaths is somehow better than if I'd died here and ended up saving them all."

"That's my point right there!" Sam shouted, slamming his laptop lid closed and pushing to stand up. "You're always so willing to be a martyr! To sacrifice yourself for everyone else! Even when you forget to do the math and think about how many more people you could save if you'd just stop even hypothetically throwing yourself in front of every bus!"

"After everything we've experienced," Dean said calmly, "You really think I would've stayed dead if I'd been killed in there, Sam?" Sam furrowed his brows at Dean's profile. "We've had our destinies and fates and all that crap laid out for us since day one, remember? Even though we ended up rejecting that crap in the end, you really think the angels or the demons would've let us stay dead before destiny played out the way they wanted it to?"

Sam thought about that for a moment as he sank slowly back into his chair. Dean watched him as the gears turned over in his head. Then Sam met his eyes again. "You know, I'd buy that brilliant sack of bullshit if you weren't still doing it now."

"What?"

"Our destiny crap?" Sam replied. "That's done. That's over. There is no free ticket anymore. No one is gonna pull us out anymore. Yet you're still...so ready to give up yourself for me. Or for anyone, really. Sometimes...sometimes I feel like...you can't wait to die," he told him quietly, sadness in his expression. "Like you want so badly out of this world, and you stick around so that if you do go out, you go out saving somebody in the process, and that makes it all okay. But it doesn't. It doesn't make it okay at all."

"You wanna tell me what, exactly, about our lives isn't selfless, Sam?" Dean replied gruffly. "What about it isn't being a goddamn martyr? This is our lives. This is what we've always done, what we've realized that we have no other choice but to do. It's a crap deal, but it is what it is, and I'm not gonna sit around an emo about it, or I really will want off this planet sooner." Sam's mouth was closed in a thin line as he breathed, nostrils flaring a bit in frustration, but considering his brother's words.

"Now, have you figured out where to find this guy? Or are we hangin' up fliers?"

TBC...