Author's Note (Important): I'm going to be out of town for a few weeks, and there are three chapters left after this. I'll post one tomorrow, before I leave, and I'll try to post the others from out of town, but I don't know how the Internet connection will be. So – anyone who really wants to read the rest in a hurry, and doesn't want to take a chance on the Net connection, please let me know and I'll send you across the rest – or maybe just post all three chapters tomorrow if enough people want that.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.


Chapter 6: Hunters

When Dean gets there, the house is dark, and there's no telltale flashlight beam or flicker of candles gleaming from any of the windows. Looks like the other guy isn't here yet.

He parks the Impala away from the house, concealed behind a clump of trees. He doesn't want to tip this Worthington person off. Then he shoves a shotgun in his pocket, grabs a flashlight, and goes to the front door.

It's rotted nearly off its hinges. Dean pushes it open carefully – he doesn't want to kick it down and warn the other guy that someone's here – and goes inside. There's a bit of moonlight filtering through the windows, enough for him to see by, so, despite his misgivings, he doesn't turn on his flashlight. He pads through the room, peering into corners, but there's nothing unusual, nothing out-of-place.

Deciding there's nothing to find in this room, he makes his way to the kitchen. It doesn't take him long to make a circuit of that, and then he's heading up the stairs.

There's a bedroom right off the landing, and Dean goes there first. Linen sheets hang in tatters on a bed over the remnants of an old-fashioned feather mattress, and the room is filled with the odds and ends of a hundred years ago, but what draws Dean's trained eye is the leather-bound book on the bedside table. It looks like it might be a diary or a journal.

Dean sits carefully on the bed, trying not to raise a storm of dust, and picks up the book. God, he misses Sam. This is the kind of thing he'd normally shove at his brother to deal with. He hates trying to decipher spidery handwriting, especially in the middle of the night, but that was the part of the job his brother seemed to thrive on. Dean opens the book and hears the worn leather crack. He groans and hopes the pages aren't going to crumble to dust under his fingers.

The ink has faded over the years, and the moonlight isn't enough to read by. With a sigh, Dean settles down on the floor with his back to the outer wall, flicks on his flashlight, and begins to read.


Sam arrives only a little out of breath. He looks up at the house, taking in the details. Front door hanging almost off its rusted hinges, looks like a couple of rooms upstairs – something that might be light in one of the upstairs windows, or might just be a trick of the moonlight.

The place is quiet.

Sam sets most of his stuff down under a tree – no sense dragging the salt and gasoline with him while he's checking out the inside – slips the gun into his belt and a flask of holy water into his hip pocket, and goes inside.

The first thing he spots is footprints. There's one set, clearly several days old from the dust that's re-settled over them, from a woman's high-heeled shoes. That'll be Kate. There are a few more, not as old as Kate's but not new either. Maybe police, maybe just curious onlookers. It doesn't matter.

What does matter is the last set of footprints, a fresh set of footprints. He can see dampness glistening on them. It's probably from the grass: he didn't see a car parked outside, so whoever left these footprints either hiked up from the town or parked a fair distance away.

Whoever left these footprints might still be inside. It's unlikely to be a ghost, but Sam Winchester knows better than anyone that ghosts aren't the only things that can kill you.

He releases the safety on his gun and steps slowly into the house.


Dean is startled from the book, although he doesn't know what it was that startled him. He stays unmoving for a moment, head cocked, listening to the silence.

Then he hears it. Downstairs. A soft creak, like an old floorboard shifting under the weight of someone trying very hard to move quietly. Dean gets to his feet, his hand going to the gun tucked into the waistband of his jeans.

He moves swiftly, noiselessly, crossing the distance to the door in a couple of strides. He waits just inside the doorway and listens again. There's nothing. He steps out to the landing. Still nothing. Dean wants to take a deep breath, but with all the dust in the air he's afraid that'll make him sneeze. He settles for a shake of his head to clear it, and then he makes his way down the stairs.

About halfway down, he spots the man. He's got his back to Dean, crouched over something on the floor.

That's all the opening Dean needs. He goes down a couple more steps, gauges the distance with his eye, and then launches himself at the other man. There's a grunt of surprise and Dean manages to get him down, but he recovers remarkably quickly, shoving Dean off him and reaching for the gun he dropped.

Dean's on him again before he can grab it. He kicks the gun out of reach as he pounces on the man, trying to pin him down. It's harder than he expected, and for a few minutes they're rolling on the ground in the dark, neither making any sound above a soft gasp. It's strange, as though they've made a pact to be as quiet as they can.

Dean doesn't waste time worrying about the strangeness, though: he can tell this guy is bigger than he is, so he doesn't want to give him any more advantages.

He manages to get the man on his stomach and get on top of him. That holds him for a minute. Then he throws Dean off. But instead of getting up right away, the man stops for a split-second to catch his breath. That's all Dean needs: he scrambles back toward the window and gets to his feet, pulling out his gun and pointing it at the man.

"Get up."

The man pushes himself up to his elbows. His hair is falling over his face. There's an odd swooping feeling in the pit of Dean's stomach and he doesn't know what it is, doesn't know what's causing it, but his subconscious seems to be taking over his motor functions and he feels his grip on the gun slackening.

He tightens it, releasing the safety. The click is loud in the near-perfect stillness, and the other man flinches.

"Get up," Dean repeats roughly.

This time the man stiffens. Dean thinks he hears a whispered, "Oh, thank God!" Before he can demand an explanation, the guy is on his feet and an achingly familiar voice is saying, "Dean?"

"No," Dean hisses. "No. You don't get to do this. I don't know who you are, but you don't get to do this to me."

The thing in front of him – it's not a man, it can't be a man – looks like Sam, the way it said his name sounded like Sam, but it isn't Sam, it can't be Sam, Sam's dead and in hell and Dean promised not to try to get him out and he kept his promise even though it broke his heart every time he thought about it and –

This. Can't. Be. Sam.

"Dean, it's me."

He's certain he never made a deal with Mia. It can't be Sam. It isn't Sam. It's a shifter or a demon or something else trying to freak him out – and it's doing a damn good job, too – but Dean isn't going to let it win, not even if it's wearing Sammy's face and it's going against every screaming instinct to keep that gun up.

"Dean, really. Look. Christo. Regna terrae, cantate Deo, psallite Domino qui fertis –"

"All right, shut up," Dean says. His voice is still rough, because he forces it to be, because he wants to hide the glimmer of hope that, despite himself, he's beginning to feel. It can't be Sam. "Get your hands on your head and come here – slowly."

The man – Dean can't think of him as Sam, not yet – complies, walking toward Dean with small, cautious, steps. When he's an arm's-length away, Dean barks, "Fine, stop."

His eyes never leaving the man, Dean reaches into his hip pocket and pulls out a flask. He fumbles it open one-handed, stretches out, and empties the contents on the man's head.

Nothing happens. Dean stares, not wanting to doubt, not daring to hope.

"Salt?" the man asks. "I've left some outside."

"Damn it, Sam –"

Dean cuts himself off, but the word is out and he's said it. He swallows, wishes he could shut his eyes, but he doesn't dare lower his guard that long. It has to be Sam, but it can't be, and he doesn't know what to do or think. If he lets himself believe – if he lets himself believe he's got his brother back and Sam gets snatched away again, Dean knows he isn't going to survive.

He looks at the man, who says nothing, just stands there with water dripping from his hair.

And then he gives Dean the look.

Dean and John always called it the look, the look that first showed up when Sam was a toddler holding up his arms to be picked up, the look that made him seem like a lost puppy and got him out of trouble with teachers and principals and school wardens and for all Dean knows even his professors in college, the look that, even when Sam grew up, Dean could never say no to.

The look is all Sam. No shapeshifter or demon has ever been able to copy it.

Dean isn't quite sure how it happens, but the next thing he knows the gun's tucked in his waistband again and he's being hugged so tightly he feels like his ribs might crack, but he doesn't complain because he's got his brother in a grip just as tight. They're having the grandmother of all chick-flick moments in the middle of a house that might be haunted, and any second those college kids are going to come in and catch them at it – Good luck persuading them that you're my brother, Sam! – but it doesn't matter. All that matters is that his arms are full of baby brother, warm and solid and alive.

Sam's clinging to him like he'll never let go. Dean can understand – Dean doesn't want to let go either. But he knows he has to, Sammy has to, because as the first shocked delight passes he remembers what he read in that journal upstairs, and he knows that if they don't get moving quickly this might be the last chick-flick moment they'll ever have.

Still Dean hesitates to spoil the moment. But then he hears Sam's soft breath next to his ear, and he knows he has to do it. Sam's back, and he'll figure out how later. Right now, he needs Sam to stay back, and that means wasting the ghost and getting the hell out.

"Sammy," Dean says, shaking him gently. "C'mon, kiddo, we can finish this later. Let's get rid of this son of a bitch and go home."

Sam nods and pulls away, and letting him do that is the hardest thing that Dean's ever done. Now that Sam's back, every big-brother instinct that Dean's got wants to keep him close, and Dean can't help being afraid that the second he breaks contact entirely Sam will vanish.

Sam seems to understand, because he says quietly, "Dean, I'm here."

Dean nods, then, and lets Sam step away from him and retrieve his gun.

"We have to do a salt-and-burn," Dean says, his voice nearly breaking when he realizes he has someone to say that to again. "We need to figure out where he's buried."

"Behind the house," Sam replies without missing a beat. Dean gapes at him, and he adds, "It was in the papers. What, you didn't do any research?"

"Why would I? That's your job." And it's so hard not to burst into tears of relief, but Dean manages to hold himself in and mumble, "You got any idea exactly where the grave is, geek boy? 'Behind the house' covers a lot of ground."

Sam rolls his eyes. "Come on. You got a shovel in the Impala?"

"How did you know I brought the Impala?"

"I know you, Dean. And because you didn't bother to do any research, you can do the digging."

Dean almost laughs.

But it's never that easy, and just as Sam is at the threshold the door slams shut in his face.


There. I did it. *g*

What do you think? Please let me know!