SUMMARY: Objects of great supernatural existence and design can seem to have a mind of their own. The Colt is no different. It has a consciousness that extends no only to the gun itself but each individual bullet. Even into the shell casings left after a shot taken has some kind of existence. The Colt and final bullet is gone, but Dean clings almost desperately to the shell left over from his single shot that killed the Demon's son. John Winchester said that the Colt was made for a Hunter, like them but on horse back. Could the little life left in the shell casing send Dean and Sam into its place of origin to meet a throwback of those early days of Hunters, where the Moon and the Sun float in the sky side by side, all animals have a human voice and the first thing that Dean lays eyes on is a young woman with eyes the color of fresh blood and looks incredibly familiar.
DISCLAIMER: All characters and plot lines of "Supernatural" belong to their respective creators. Tuscarora and other major land features are existing parts of Nevada and belong to themselves while all characters and lay outs of such places and so on are completely fabricated by yours truly. Several different "spirits" and "gods" are based on Native American legend and creational stories, though they are also completely fictional.
All spirits, gods, individual characters, horses, dogs, Celia Northwind (Red) are © to Mary C. Tripp (that's me). No stealies!
Like Us, But On Horse Back
"Not necessity, not desire - no, the love of power is the demon of men. Let them have everything - health, food, a place to live, entertainment - they are and remain unhappy and low-spirited: for the demon waits and waits and will be satisfied."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
"The true secret of giving advice is, after you have honestly given it, to be perfectly indifferent whether it is taken or not, and never persist in trying to set people right."
-Hannah Whitall Smith
…
Celia tensed in confusion, turning the pill bottle hand over in her hand.
"Excuse me?" She asked tersely.
"You heard me, girl." The same honey voice said over the line. "Don't go tearing into Dean just yet."
"Who is this?" Celia snarled low and dangerous.
"Oh darlin', this is Missouri, don't tell me you're starting to forget things, too."
"Missouri?"
"Missouri Mosley, down in Lawrence Kansas, Celia."
Irritation and stress finally was starting to get to her, Celia breathed out trying to settle her anger and licked the roof of her mouth to calm herself. "Ma'am, I'm not aware of anyone named Mosley in Lawrence. I think you have the wrong number-"
"Young lady don't you dare hang up that phone!"
"Have a nice day ma'am." Celia snapped her phone shut with a sniff and set it on the table as she scoured Dean's jacket, coming up with two more pill bottles. One of caffeine pills and the other some drug she'd never heard off. Both written by and prescribed to different rock stars.
"Honestly." She muttered, setting down a bottle telling 'Joe DiMaggio' only to take as needed. The bottle was only a third of the way full and the fill date was barely a week prior. "He's goin' through these damn things like candy."
Her cell phone buzzed to life. Celia reached out and flipped it open, setting it in the crook of her shoulder and ear as she continued to rummage though Dean's jacket coming up with another bottle of methamphetamines. How the hell does he stash it all?
"Red."
"Celia Mihkwaw Northwind-Greer don't ya dare hang up that phone again or I will come up there and knock some sense into you!" Missouri Mosley's voice barked authoritatively over the phone line. Celia started, like all young people did, at the use of her full name.
"Ma'am-"
"Don't you 'ma'am' me, young lady. Now you listen to me and listen good. I know about you and those boys and I know about what's happening to Dean as much as I know about what's happening to Sam. Get a hold on that mean streak of yours and just listen to me for a minuet!"
Celia was coiled so tightly she wasn't aware that she was grinding her teeth. It was true she did have a streak in her, but she could control it easy as she could breathe. Or at least that's what she thought personally. It was an insult to her that someone, a complete stranger over the phone was daring to suggest otherwise. It was a stereotype that small towns in America ran mostly on the steam of their own pride and tradition. It wasn't a stereotype that went unsupported and Celia was no different than any small town girl that had willingly turned on her back for a 'good' life in town. She was pretty enough, smart enough, talented enough and had all the traits that if she so much as stepped foot into a true city the door to opportunity and luxury would have been torn off its hinges for her. Celia had hometown and personal pride that she threw her shoulders back and lifted her chin and sneered as she watched countless local girls go tearing off for the horizon without looking back and saw them as cowardly traitors.
To have that questioned boiled the blood more than any persistent phone call would have. The woman on the other end would have been better off taunting a rattle snake.
"Celia don't you dare get worked up at me for no reason more than pride. You better deflate yourself this second. Calm down. You'll wake Sam up hollering at me. Dean, too. Lord knows that boy needs the sleep."
Celia's blood froze.
"How-"
"I'm telepathic, honey. The emotional mine field over there keeps exploding and I can feel it from here!" Missouri barked like an overly excited mother.
Celia snarled low under her breath. "A seer? Ya a goddamn seer. Fuckin' buidaigwade. Don't call this number again!" Celia hissed and snapped the phone shut again and tossed it onto the table top. She stormed out of the kitchen and across the porch. The caramel colored German shepherd Buckshot lurched up to his paws and trotted towards the door; the dog nudged it open and loped across the veranda, down the stairs and across the yard after Celia. He stopped and looked back over his shoulder at the sound of the cell phone ringing. He whined quietly but kept his jaws shut for the time being. Celia hauled herself up on the flat bed with the Impala. She pulled open the driver's seat and sat down on the edge of the leather seat and rummage under the driver's seat, then the passenger seat, she breathed a sigh of relief at finding nothing and flipped open the glove compartment. Nothing in the space and she pulled out the wooden box and flipped it open. She sighed and actually smiled good naturedly at the assorted badges and fake identification cards. She held one up.
"Homeland Security. Huh? That some serious sand to pack there, Dean." She said to herself and dropped the i.d. back into the box, shut it and put it back into the glove compartment. She pushed herself out of the front seat, shut the door and slipped into the back, she pulled a black gym bag towards her and rummaged in it, opening the different compartments and digging into the pockets of jeans and flannels. Nothing but she took a second to admire an artfully curved blade. She tried to bend the blade experimentally, the metal didn't give at all.
"Stupid foreign knives, no give at all. Snap to fast." She muttered and settled the blade back into the bag and started into another one, this one was beaten canvas of dark red and black. She unzipped the main bag and went through the same process. It must have been Dean's. She came up with another pill bottle for caffeine pills, empty and barely a week and a half old. She dug more vigorously and checked the other pockets in the bag. She started when she came up with a roll of cloth. She sniffed it and choked, coughing heavily as her overly sensitive nose was swamped with irritants and started to burn. Her eyes started to water and she swiftly unrolled the cloth, covering her nose with her hand.
Small bundles of different dried and prepared herbs.
"Feverfew…yarrow…boneset, goddamnit he's tryin' to kill himself." She muttered and rolled the herbs back into the cloth and set it next to the pill bottle. She kept digging into that bag and then a smaller pack, finding two more empty bottles and one half full of a serious antidepressant drug, as well as a small bottle of aged brandy.
She snorted and pushed herself out of the back seat having found nothing in Sam's laptop satchel. She tucked the bundle of herbs into her back pocket and gathered the pill bottle, tossing the empty ones out onto the hard packed drive and slipped the antidepressant into the front pocket of her flannel shirt. She shut the door and made her way around to the trunk.
"Let's see how stocked ya boys are, shall we?" She muttered and swiftly pulled her bone hilt knife from her hip, knelt next to the trunk and with a swift and practiced twist popped the lock and pushed the trunk open. She glanced around the empty space for second, going through some rumpled clothes and another full gym bag and glanced at am empty one. Finding nothing she easily pulled open the false bottom. Celia held it up for a second. She sighed.
"Not bad boys, but yer missin' some essentials." She muttered and finding no other way to keep the lid up propped it with a well loved sawed off shotgun. She rummaged through the weaponry, ammo, stock and supplies the boys had acquired over their hunts. She found nothing expect for stores of the same herbs but she was unwilling to raid their stash in case it was needed and with the way the day was acting and foretelling the future she had a belief that anything she took from the truck would be forgotten and not restocked and then were would Sam and Dean be if they didn't have it when they needed it. She lifted a .45 and dusted the stock and barrel off; it was still streaked with rock salt.
"Don't clean up regularly do ya?" Celia asked. And setting the handgun back into the armory. She reached for a Desert Eagle handgun and lifted it. She shook her head, the barrel was jammed. She slipped her knife from its sheath and deftly popped the screws with the blade tip and easily took the gun apart. She growled and used the knife to dislodge a jammed shell casing. Celia looked into the trunk and pulled out a drop cloth and swiftly cleaned the pieces and reassembled the Desert Eagle in a speed that would startle the most hard-assed sergeant in the SEAL training program. She checked the screws once, cocked the gun and pulled the trigger. The Desert Eagle made a smooth tell tale click of a strong delivery if it had been loaded.
Celia nodded approvingly, swiftly loaded a clip of silver rounds, put on the safety and set the Desert Eagle back into the mass of weaponry. Having found no more evidence of drugs or paraphernalia she pushed the lid up, set the sawed off shotgun back into the trunk and dropped the false bottom. She pushed the trunk lid back down.
She decided to make this another of her main points when she started hollering at Dean for what he was doing to himself. So far on the outline of her lecture she had started big: Sam.
Then the Impala, the threat of him passing out at the wheel and totaling the car would put a fear in him.
His sloppiness on the job.
Then his inattentiveness to his weaponry.
That should put the wolf back in him, if he was anything like his mother.
She could hardly bark at him about self-destruction. The boy had no sense of self-worth. Too damn ready to throw his life away for someone else. He'd always been that way, as far as Celia could remember. She couldn't understand why the same young man that she knew to go out of his way to climb a perilous, twenty-five foot tall mountain of stacked hay bales to return a week old kitten back to it's feral littler only getting hisses and scratches in return much less work himself to near death for perfect strangers on a regular basis didn't think himself worth a grain of salt. His attitude had always left a bitter taste in her mouth.
Celia dropped off the flat bed with a grunt and hopped once, flinching as pain exploded into her left knee briefly. She limped heavily for a few steps, scooping up the empty bottles and the brandy. Her rhythm returned to her walk and she climbed the steps, crossed the porch and back into the kitchen. Buckshot pushing passed the screen door before it swung shut with a casual bang. She dumped the empty bottled next to the other confiscated drugs, pulled out the roll of herbs, set down the alcohol.
With a sick sigh she reached into her flannel pocket and looked at the bottle, reading the ingredients. This was an antidepressant that put one to sleep, it was practically the same thing as some of the tranquilizers that the Greers and herself used on the cattle and horses when needed.
"Dean, yer gonna have to tell me what the hell drove ya over the edge. Ya used to be so full of life; ya might as well be dead with this stuff swimmin' in her system." She growled, deciding she was going to have to look up the drug because she noted that the doctor's name and signature weren't forged. He'd actually gone to a real doctor for this one.
Her cell rang loudly and she reached for it distractedly, flipping it open and setting it to her ear, as she opened the cap and sniffed at the pills. She let out a distasteful snort and set the bottle aside.
"Red."
"Young lady I am not going to tell you again to listen to me!"
Celia started, appalled and clearly struck that she had not made her point strictly clear.
"And don't you dare call me that again! You need to watch your language, I understand you were raised in a barn but a pretty young thing with your temperament shouldn't behave in such a way!" Missouri Mosley scolded sharply from Kansas.
Celia was absolutely shocked that this woman, this seer was daring to speak to her in such a way.
"Honey, put your hate and distrust away, this is about the boys, not you. Now listen to me! For them!"
Celia tensed and growled so low in her throat, hissing dangerously. She was again cut off before she could speak.
"Stop that now! Listen missy, there's more than habit and coincidence that sent to boys back to you. There are things at work here, bigger than you can imagine. Something pushed them back to you, now I'm not sure what but it's strong and has its own and their interest in mind. Things are getting desperate for those boys. They needed you, maybe you needed them too. I know you haven't seen Sam in a long time and Dean…I'm sure this is about him. That damn dog wouldn't go after him if it wasn't."
She was calling the coyote a dog if Celia understood right, the coyote wanted Dean out of spite, a grudge. This woman had no idea.
"Fine coyote, then. And its more than just a grudge."
Celia growled and bared her teeth like an animal to no one, just in pure anger and frustration.
"Can you help him? I don't think he knows how much he's hurting himself, much less everyone around him. I don't think he understands or has the sense to understand or stop himself, he's lost. I know…I know it's hard and unfair but he needs you and that horse, too."
Celia tensed so tightly that if she had been a machine her steel coil muscled would have snapped.
"What horse?"
"That horse with blue eyes and a white face. The one he dreams about. That mustang."
Missouri Mosley should have kept her mouth shut, she had bitten off more than she could chew. The next thing she said she regretted instantly as Celia's patience snapped entirely.
"Ghost, that's the name."
"How…the hell…do ya know 'bout the Ghost!?" Celia snarled. Her well kept patience, the steady hand, voice, eye and nerve that only a lifetime of working with horses, living the middle child life, twenty years a rancher, the baby sister of a brother that spent the majority of the last five years in a war zone, dealt with a younger sister more than ten years her junior and the skills learned in hunting honed. The patience and clam and steadiness that Nathaniel and Rosa Greer had instilled, taught and ground into her over the course of her twenty-four year lifespan. The patience that it took to learn to control the monster and strength in her small frame.
Everything about her life and existence was about keeping her cool and calm. She was patience incarnate.
The levy broke.
And Missouri Mosley felt it. And she panicked.
"Celia-"
"Now ya listen to me, Miss Missouri Mosley." Celia's voice was low but pure poison, if anyone had looked in her eyes they would have reeled at the purest and darkest black they had turned. Pit less holes that were darker than the spans of space between the stars. So black they reflected no light, she turned on her heel and walked out to stand in the yard so she did not wake Sam or Dean.
"Ya think ya know what the hell yer talkin' 'bout by throwin' names and dreams ya catch on the wind. I expect nothin' less from one of yer kind but know this. Ya. Know. Nothin'. What ya are suggestin' is beyond yer reach and stretchin' further ya touch the bone in the wolf's throat. Now, let me make myself perfectly clear. DON'T call here again, DON'T go lookin' to wade any deeper into this river, DON'T dare to take a step closer to me, the boys or the horse. Ya so much as send someone, step foot on the earth of my state of Nevada, turn to look west I assure ya that ya will not see the light of another comin' day. Ya think ya know things, understand things because ya catch wind of them. Well I know yer breed Mosley, I know the buidaigwade from blood spilled experience. Take this as yer first, final and only warnin' and take it on yerself to warn the rest of yer God-forsaken, bad-medicine, disease-carryin', bastard seer kin 'cause they'll get no such warnin'. Ya are not welcome and I DON'T tolerate or hesitate, yer kind do not have the given rights or the luxury of a first chance.Yer kind are my enemy and a threat to my own and for that ya are dead on sight without exception! Am I as clear as mud or water?!"
In Kansas Missouri Mosley felt a terror so deep and painful burst like a fresh wound in her chest. She feared for Sam's life with good reason.
"Celia-"
"BUIDAIGWADE AM I CLEAR!?! WITHOUT EXCEPTION!" Celia roared into the cell phone, making several horses head jerk up in shock and Sam twitch in his sleep on the couch in the house.
"Yes." Missouri Mosley squeaked reining herself in and back from the slamming wall over wall of rage and hate that the normally tolerant and gentle natured woman expressed as she was over come with a blinding state of instinct driven violence.
That seemed to calm the roaring monster and Celia settled.
"Good. Good girl. Now if ya so much as breathe a word of the Ghost to anyone, anyone I swear by the red clay under my feet that I will come down on ya like a hurricane. Faster than a Bluetick on a coon and trust me when I say that ya don't want this hound's nose to yer tail. Ya'll never have another day of peace. Yes?"
"Yes."
"Good, do not call here again. Have a nice day, Miss Mosley."
Without another second Celia snapped the phone shut and stuffed it into her pocket. She pressed the heels of her palms into her ears and took in a deep breath that had it been anyone else would have flowed back out in a blood curdling scream of anger. Celia only let out a practically pained and silent exhale. Letting all the rage and hate flow out of her and towards the earth. It seemed to be the only thing keeping her upright and she nearly collapsed as exhaustion crashed into her sharply. She staggered a little and swallowed dryly, taking a few short and quick breaths to steady herself.
I was provoked, I was provoked, I was provoked…she told herself over and over again. That woman knew 'bout the Ghost, 'bout Dean and Sam, 'bout me…I was provoked…she was a fuckin' seer, a buidaigwade…less than human…I was provoked…
No matter how many times she thought it, understood it and used it as an excuse it left a bitter and metallic taste in her mouth. Like blood.
She hated that she had acted that way, lost control and taken it out on a stranger. It wasn't like her. She didn't care if the woman was a seer, she had only wanted to express her concern for the Winchesters. Wanted to help, that was no way to treat a person at all, no matter who they were. She twisted around and looked at the house, Buckshot was standing on the other side of the screen door and looking at her quietly, waiting.
What kind of example was she? What would her sister and brother think of her for that? What of her adoptive mother Rosa if she knew?
What would Sam and Dean think if they knew?
And Nathaniel?
Buckshot cocked his head at her and whined. Saying and asking everything in the noise. He knew it was wrong as much as she did.
That wasn't her that had spoken over the phone line, well buried, deep seeded rage had taken advantage of her in a moment of…fear…for what Mosley had suggested.
Swallowing every ounce of pride and hate she had Celia pulled out her cell phone, pulled up Mosely's number from the memory and hit send.
She stood with the phone to her ear and waited.
"Yes, Celia?" Mosley asked tentatively from the other end, waiting with nervousness in her voice. Celia took a deep shaky breath and steadied herself, putting up the same voice that she used in the beginning exchanges with Ezekiel Lynch.
"Miss Mosley I understand ya are worried 'bout the boys and I appreciate yer warnin'. I will do what I can with what ya have said in mind." Celia ground her teeth and pulled every ounce of her reservoir of trained manners and self control and will power. "Thank ya and I hope that ya have a good day." She grit out, trying very hard not to spit out the words for all the distaste and hate swallowed around them.
"You're welcome."
Celia didn't hesitate to snap the phone shut, this time as she clawed in frustration at her face and tilted her hat back, letting out an ill tempter and well controlled snarl of frustration.
She felt a light breeze brush across her face and hands, ruffling her hair in an almost familiar way.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." She said to no one in particular.
The warning and advice from Mosley hung in the back of her mind, nudging at her. But Celia stubbornly returned to what she knew. What she experienced, she wasn't prejudice for no reason.
It's not worth a grain of salt…buidaigwade aren't anthin' but trouble, cain't be trusted, not them, not a word they say. It ain't gonna happen again, not with a Winchester on the end of it. I won't let it. She told herself quietly and started back up the steps feeling extremely tired but better about herself after the outburst. She could feel a low rumbling snarl in her ear and she only smiled, though she had let it go there for a second she checked herself.
The snarl only became a disgruntled mutter in her ear. And she inwardly snorted, almost smugly.
"Boss?"
He radio, still settled onto her hip, she pulled it free and clicked open the channel.
"This is Red." She said into the radio as she walked up the steps, across the deck and back into the house. She went into the mud room and rummaged until she found a heavy wooden box with a latch.
"Red, this is Murphy."
"What can I do ya for, Murph? Y'all headin' in? I think Jess and her crew are goin' to head out for the night shift, God bless that girl takin' Kurt's run on a holiday weekend, she's a saint." Celia muttered distractedly as she walked back into the kitchen and started putting the pill bottles, both empty and full into the box, the roll of herbs too. She rummaged and came up with a combo lock from the junk drawer and locked the box shut.
Celia was upset, tired and straining to a point that it was almost painful. Her knee was throbbing painfully. She could feel her blood pounding in her views. Mosley's interference, the fact that Sam was passed out on her couch and Dean was not only in struggling with heat stroke but was suffering from substance abuse and with drawl. The stress was getting to her and she was 'rambling'.
For as much talking she had done that day Celia's days were normally spent in silence. She was a quiet person and the fact that she was 'talking-up-a-storm' was another topic that was being discussed in the beauty shop over pink lemonade and as Celia would find out very soon, tea cakes.
Simone Murphy and Charles 'Chuck' Murphy and their crew had been radioing back and forth on their patrol ride, talking about how odd it was that Celia was speaking so much. Simone was a little skeptical as she could easily claim that, "never heard Ol' Red string more than five words together at once." She was surprised by the fact that the speculation was true.
"Um, Red? We got a problem."
"What?" Celia asked sharply, sounding more like herself than she had for the last five hours, since the Winchesters had breezed into her life again.
"We just found a couple of ponies. Looks like a wolf pack." Murphy carefully said over the line.
Celia was silent, her teeth ground together as she set the locked box up on top of the refrigerator and pushed it back out of sight, having to stand up on her tip-toes.
"How many?" Celia asked deadly.
"Three, two colts. They were Nakotas Red."
"Thanks Murph. I'll mark it. Head on back in and check up on Jess to make sure she's en-route."
"Ya got it Red. I'll send Chuck back out with the truck to pick up the carcasses for taggin'."
"Thanks Murph. I'll call ya later."
Celia set the radio down, stood shakily, leaning heavily on her hands over her table. She was shivering violently. The explosive flashes of emotions and strain crashed together so completely that she suddenly felt nothing. There was silence in the house except for the slight snoring of Sam on the couch and the steady ticking of the clock over her head.
Now three more of the mustangs, the Nokotas no less, were dead.
"THIS CAIN'T GET ANY WORSE!" Celia screamed at the top of her lungs, rattling the windows. Both dogs under the table leapt to their feet. Dean and Valentine jerked up from their sleep. They looked at each other trying to understand what happened.
Sam lurched up from his drug induced doze scrambling to sit up; his mop of chocolate brown hair was mussed and ruffled in his eyes from the comfort of sleep. He rubbed blearily at his face and one lanky arm draped over the back of the couch, looking at her through glazed cinnamon eyes.
"Wazzah madder?" He muttered, looking around at her and not quiet focusing through the heavy influence of the cortizone shots.
"Nothin' Sammy, got back to sleep." Celia soothed and waved her hand at him gently from the kitchen, scolding herself for reacting that way.
"'M kay…" Sam muttered and dropped back out of sigh behind the couch, one of his hands stayed draped over the back, slack and twitching slightly. He was lost back into an unusually mild dream in a few seconds.
"This cain't get any worse…it just cain't…" Celia reasoned.
…
Dean pushed himself up slowly. He flinched, grinding his teeth laboriously as pain rippled over his body with each breath and movement, though it seemed less sharp than it had been the last time he was awake. How had he gone from no sleep to nothing but? Why did he feel like hell? Another thought struck him…
Was this what hell felt like?
Dean pushed himself away from the white dog.
Valentine whined quietly and pinned his ears as Dean stiffly sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He gasped quietly and flinched painfully as his bare feet settled onto the ice cold hardwood floor. Everything was strained and painful, everything was a hundred times harder and his vision and mind swam with heat and blurred edges.
But instinct drove him on, and instinct he listened to more than his own survival needs. Everything in his body that was telling him to take care of himself was overridden by a single clear thought and understanding.
Someone near by had screamed, someone needed help.
Dean shakily pushed himself to his feet and shuffled out of the room, once he was moving he found it hard to stop. His surroundings were strange, he couldn't place why they were oddly familiar but where they belonged just didn't dovetail with his swirling memory.
Valentine actually swallowed and dropped down off of the bed and trotted to catch up. Dena jumped as the dog brushed against his knee, whined and looked up at him.
Dean instinctively reached out and curled shaky fingers around Valentine's thick leather collar and actually leaned weight on the large dog for support. Dean breathed in heavily, straightening up as much as he could and putting up as much of a front as possible he started for the kitchen, the white shepherd taking a slow step every few seconds to keep up with him. Dean threw back his shoulders, swallowed and hardened as much as possible.
Halfway down the hall his stomach lurched painfully and Dean flung himself into the bathroom thankfully directly on his left, to the toilet and vomited up everything in his stomach into the bowl.
…
The heaving sounds made Celia stop dead in her tracks and look up.
"Gods forsake it." She snarled, looking heaven-ward, "Y'all sure like makin' me eat my words don't ya?!" She jogged to the bathroom were Valentine was standing in the doorway, his ears pinned and looking unsure what to do. Celia pushed passed to dog to Dean as he heaved over the toilet bowl. There wasn't much to put into the bowl. What looked like some half dissolved medication, all the Gatorade he'd drunk, some coffee and alcohol; Celia wasn't too happy to know that Dean seemed to be on a liquid diet.
Celia bent next to Dean and laid a comforting and assuring hand on his shoulder as he gasped and coughed painfully over the toilet bowl.
Celia flinched, dry-heaves were the worst; vomiting she could handle, even gagging but dry-heaves…
She waited and when it seemed like Dean could only manage to get up ropes of discolored saliva Celia reached across and flushed the contents of his stomach. Celia left his side briefly to soak ANOTHER wash cloth in cold water; she didn't bother to ring out the water. Returning to the irregularly dry-heaving Dean, she nudged him to sit back on his heels and knees.
His arms shivered from the shock of vomiting and his hands stayed locked in a painfully tight grip on the sides of the toilet seat. Celia swiftly wiped the cloth across Dean's face and mouth, cleaning away any debris and turned back to the sink. She cranked up the water and rinsed the fabric thoroughly. Celia reached out with her free hand and gently rested her fingertips on Dean's nearside temple and brushed a short curved path over his skin; through his hair and around his ear. His fever at least was steady but now Celia was having a hard time separating the heat stroke symptoms from the withdrawal symptoms.
Halen had said to treat it like the stroke. So be it.
She draped the dripping, colt wash cloth over her hand and pressed her palm flat across his forehead, the drenched fabric between.
Dean jerked and gasped a little before he felt the cool water start to alleviate his scorched flesh, droplets of water flowing miniature rivers over his face and down his neck drawing away sweat and strain. Dean sighed heavily and leaned into her touch until Celia was supporting the full weight of Dean's skull. He sighed, quiet and content. Dean peeled one of his hands away from the toilet seat with a stomach turning snapping of damp skin. His large hand settled over hers, pressing it closer to the heat of his forehead. Dean tried to link his fingers with hers but finding no give compensated by pressing into the back of her hand.
Dean sighed, again, contented and shut his eyes when Celia smoothly rubbed the wash cloth down his face, over his mouth and chin and down his neck. She felt him swallow thickly the rippling of muscle and tissue under her light fingers and Dean's heavier paw.
He'd kept it firmly pressed over hers as she washed his face and neck, keeping up with each of her moves. He was forced to draw his hand back when she reached to wet his ears and the overly sensitive flesh around and behind them. Dean winced and his head titled instinctively into her hand. The same for the right side when she reached around to the far side of his head.
Dean shook his head once the wash cloth left his skin, the motion stirred his brain and stomach and Dean gagged once but fought it down.
"Dean, ya alright?"
"Yeah…'m kay…" Dean panted.
"Liar." Celia said quietly, she was letting her strain get to her and she was expressing the tiniest run of it towards Dean just for the mere fact that he was weak enough to let himself get sick, it was a pitiful excuse to get mad at him and she let it go in a hurry when he looked up at her through long lashes and sweat soaked strands of hair and smiled gently.
She felt her heart melt when he licked his dry and cracked lips, "Yeah…you're right." He said quietly.
She smiled gently back at him, "Are ya at least feelin' a little better?" All the malice and stress and anger flowed out of her at the gentle soul behind the emerald pools looking up at her. Don't lose that Dean, don't change that, that's who ya are she inwardly begged.
"Yes." He rasped out quietly.
"Do ya think ya can hold some water down?" She asked.
Dean barely nodded, but his arms still shook and his grip was still dead tight on the toilet seat.
"Alright." She dumped the wash cloth into the hamper, braced a hand under his elbow and pulled him upwards. "On yer feet, Dean."
Dean scrambled and wobbled to get back to his feet, Celia sympathetically gave him enough time to steady himself by increments until he was back up right and backing off a little to give him some room to stand on his own, Dean was swallowing hard to keep from going into a fit of dry-heaving all over again. But he seemed to be gaining a little of himself back.
Hell when you hit bottom there was no way but up.
"What ya get out of bed for anyway? Doc Halen want's ya off yer feet." Celia asked as Dean looped his hand under the waiting Valentine's collar and put more weight on the white dog than he did on Celia though she was a little comforted when Dean willingly rested his hand on her shoulder. He seemed to be feeling better or trying to play it off as he smiled halfheartedly and shrugged nonchalantly. Though the pass of a flinch of pain across his face, the thick swallow and the pale pallor told a different story.
"I heard a scream." Dean reasoned with a shiver as the fever bit at him for a second before he forced it away.
She shook her head, old habits never really die, do they?
"That was me, I got frustrated is all." She said quietly.
Concern crossed Dean's pale face and his smile slipped away. "What's wrong?"
"I got to try and get out to my herd but it's a bad idea leavin' ya the way ya are with Sam passed out on the couch." Celia sighed. Dean tensed, halting their slow walk towards the guest room.
"Sam?" He asked sharply.
"He's got a couple shots of cortizone in him to stop the pain in his skin, he's got second degree sunburn remember?" Celia quickly assured, knowing that the quickest way to get Dean in a rile was let him think Sam was hurting.
Dean nodded slightly and flinched, his face pinching in pain.
"And ya have heat stroke, remember? That's why ya just threw up and why ya feel like a bull had a good turn poundin' ya into the hard pack." Or a coyote. Celia soothed and got him moving again.
Dean gave a bare nod, and swallowed dryly. "Yeah." He managed out, hesitating and biting his lower lip. "Thanks, Red. We'll get out of your hair as soon…" He winced and took a deep breath, "…as soon as Sam wakes up."
"Sorry Dean, yer in no state to go anywhere, and neither is the Impala."
Dean paled considerably. "My baby?"
"She's on a flat bed out in the yard, I'm gonna make a call into Elko and order the fuel line for ya. No worries Dean, I don't mind y'all stayin' until yer good to move. Y'all did come out here to see me anyway. I feel a little responsible."
"Don't Red, it's not your fault. It's was mine, it was pretty stupid just standing out there in the sun. I got Sam hurt and now we're imposing on you."
Celia sighed, "Well if yer anythin' as stubborn as I am let's call it a wash." She and Valentine successfully helped Dean into the guest room and back to the bed while giving the young man the feigned belief that he was moving on his own will power. Celia wasn't the only one with pride. She felt weight come down on her shoulder as Dean eased himself down on the mattress and let out a tightly held sigh.
"And ya boys are gonna stay with me." She snorted quietly and turned back out of the room. Dean smiled slightly and contented himself with scratching Valentine under his chin.
"Well you aren't as terrifying when you're flying into people's stomachs, are you?" Dean asked, Valentine only panted in happiness as Dean really scratched under his chin.
"That dog was dipped in sugar when he was a pup, couldn't ya tell from that fur of his?" Celia asked gently as she returned with a glass of water and a large plastic bowl. She handed him the glass of water and watched with a practiced eye as he tried to force it down and keep it down. He gagged sharply with a pained gasped and Celia used lightening quick reflexes to get the bowl under him before the regurgitated water could get anywhere near the floor.
Dean flushed in embarrassment as Celia set the bowl on the floor next to the bed.
"Ya can try again later." She gently assured him but kept it to herself that it was bad when a body couldn't keep water down. And he still wasn't sweating. This seemed to be going down hill, even if Dean seemed to be feeling better and acting like it, too "Dean, ya gonna hurt yerself if I get to my herd for a few hours?"
Dean smiled slyly, "I can't make any promises…trouble is a lady that likes me."
Oh Lord Dean, ya did not just say that, Celia raised an eyebrow and fixed him with a look that withered many men. A skeptical, questioning look to make sure that he was sure that was what he meant. Dean slumped a little, his smiling faltering.
"Uh huh." Celia sighed and stepped out of the room. One thing was true, trouble came to Dean without a second thought. She needed to keep him in one spot and busy. Her first thought was to dump him with her laptop, but as sick as he was he was still Dean Winchester and she was sure she would be stripping her hard drive of kinky website links for hours after he touched it. That left music, literature or film.
She wished he would go for a book, but she doubted it. Dean didn't have much interest in the written word unless it was a lead, he wasn't always that way. Maybe she could wean him off of porno websites and magazine articles about Oprah back to actual books.
She knew he'd just gripe about her music for gods only knows how long.
Film it was.
She exited the guest room and stalked up the steps to her room, she rummaged around looking through boxes and gear until she came up with a still in the package portable DVD player. The Greer family had a black sheep, alright, Cousin Nicky who couldn't breathe air that hadn't already been put through a purifier. She was an editor and fashion columnist up in Chicago. Celia had actually gone with Elijah once to visit her barely a few years ago. She had been disgusted and unable to understand the overly plush standard of living that Nicky had much less the sickeningly high priced diet, apartment at the skyline and a boyfriend made mostly out of plastic. It had taken a lot of will power for her not to let Buckshot, who had joined them on the run, to tear apart the walking fur ball of a dog that did nothing but yap endlessly that Nicky excitedly dubbed Prada the Pomeranian Princess. Cousin Nicky had a bad habit of sending very expensive and lush gifts to her, in her mind, deprived family members and the DVD player had not yet met the fate of the countless other gifts and been donated to charity.
She silently thanked Cousin Nicky and prayed that she soon acquired some common sense. Deftly Celia stripped the box away, briefed the instructions and got the thing working in a few seconds. Now she needed something to keep his attention for a few hours if he intended to keep himself awake, or just until he fell asleep again.
Preferably something to his interest.
Stephen King.
Celia trotted back down the stairs to the entertainment shelf and flipped through the rows of DVD until she found one: Rose Red. She glanced briefly at the description. A team of paranormal investigators, physics and a telepathic little girl go to try and wake up a dormant house that builds itself and swallows trespassers and guests, in Seattle.
If people only knew.
Celia shrugged, whatever worked. It was this or haul Dean's pale ass into the living room and leave him with afternoon television and prime-time programming. Yeah, he'd go wandering and probably collapse in the first few hour and a half. She loaded the DVD and took the case with her; it was a double disc-er. She cued up the movie and went back into her kitchen and to the refrigerator and rummaged around until she found a can of Sprite to help settled Dean's stomach.
Armed in such a way she went back to Dean's side and smiled sadly to find him sitting awkwardly cross legged with the bowl in his lap and Valentine draped across the quilt next to him and hanging his paws and head over the edge of the bed. She held up the DVD and player and the soda, setting the latter down on the floor next to the glass of water and handed him the player. His hand shook at he took it and she tossed the case on the bed. Dean looked up at her and cocked and eyebrow.
"Think it may keep ya still enough that 'Lady Trouble' don't come knockin' for a few hours?"
Dean flushed slightly, embarrassed by his own lame attempt and swallowing dryly nodded.
"Alright, I'll be back 'round then. Try and get the water to stay, if ya can give the soda a try." She commanded gently.
"Thanks." Dean sighed quietly. Celia nodded, then considering for a second pulled the walkie-talkie from her hip made sure it was on channel two and set it next to the drinks.
"Just in case, channel two."
Dean nodded and watched her back it left the room. He settled back against the pillows, swallowing thickly to keep his stomach still through the rolling fever. He started the movie after glancing at the description and finding it slightly interesting. But the opening credits didn't hold his attention as he glanced out the window at the sound of the screen door swinging shut. Celia crossed the yard with another dog on her heels. She actually looked like she was yelling as she walked. Dean leaned forward to watch her cross the yard and disappear into a massive barn. A few minuets later she came out with a bridle and reins in her hands and ducked through a fence to set the bridle into the mouth and over the head of a place colored horse. She vaulted up onto the animal's back, not wasting time with a saddle and she, the horse and the dog trotted out of sight. Dean leaned back and sighed, looking down at Valentine.
The large dog lifted his ears forward and then his head off the mattress with a soft whine.
"I don't suppose you could tell me why she and this whole place is so familiar, could you?" He rasped out to the white dog.
Valentine cocked and ear back and whined quietly again before belly crawling over to curl up next to Dean. The elder Winchester sighed, smiled and scooted down further into the pillows and quilt to snuggle with the dog. Though if he asked himself or was asked by anyone it was NOT snuggling!
"Yeah, I figured not." He yawned and concentrated on the movie, it actually caught his attention and held him securely and he spent much of the first disc picking out who was doing what and which ones he would have shot in the face.
…
Celia picked up another walkie-talkie on her way out the door and setting it to channel two set it into place on her belt ane pushed the door open, holding it wide with her hip and leg. She gave a short commanind whistle not loud enough to reach Sam on the couch.
"Buck, let's go to work!" She called to the German shepherd as she walked out, Buckshot bounded after her, down the steps and ready to get moving. He galloped across the yard, already on his way out to the far pasture to nip at bovine heels before Celia got the chance to call him off.
Celia decided to rush the job, not so much as it was insufficient but shave off two or three hours. Maybe she could get the cattle in, the horses stalled, bedded and fed before eight. She crossed the yards in long strides her eyes flicking across the yard, bar house, gates making sure that everything was closed up the right way, which would shave time off plenty, too. She was somewhat glad that the rest of the family was out of town; at least she didn't have to worry about anything being out of place for the mere reason that someone else had done it by accident.
She looked to the pasture and growled.
The Greer's twenty-five some odd horses were clustered en masse, their heads swung together and nickering, snorting, pawing at the earth and nipping at each other. There were solid colored animals, painted, roaned but the majority of them were appaloosa. Celia could easily name them all, and there was a time once that Dean could have too. They were quiet the mismatched group. The two honey colored Percheron draft horses, Bonny and Bo towered over the thicker and stockier ranch horses and ponies, a mule and two miniature horses barely two feet tall at the shoulder. There were a few mustangs mingled in the group but not that many.
"Oh shut up, all of ya!" She barked making every single one of them jump, the mustangs scatter and every head swung around to look at her in mild shock or annoyance.
"Y'all are worse than any of the Birds down in the beauty shop! I'll make sure to put pink lemonade into the troughs next time! Quit gossipin'!" Celia barked at them storming into the barn and deciding to ride bareback, she jogged to the tack room, pulled down a snaffle bitted bridle and jogged back out into the sunlight. She ducked between the bars of a pipe gate and whistled sharply, every horse turned to look at her and most of them started walking towards her.
"Honeycatcher! 'Catcher! Let's go to work!" Celia called.
With a short, the same pale stud that had called over the gate to Blackbird and Strawbury broke away from them and trotted towards her. He was taller in the shoulder and longer in the leg than most of the other horses in the herd and trotted right up to push his nose into her palm.
The pale color of his coat, almost flecked with gold was called 'cremello', hard to come by and the stud was worth more than his weight in the work he did and his sweet nature. He practically scooped the bit up out of her hand and ducked his head to make it easier for her to fit the bridle over his head, she threw the reins over the stud's shoulder and vaulted up onto his back, she settled herself right behind his shoulder. The stud hopped into a lop with a click of Celia's tongue and they galloped after Buckshot to root the herd of Red Furs and Black Angus cattle out. The buckskin Blackbird trotted a few steps with the red roan appaloosa Strawbury hugging his side. The pretty tri-colored paint mare, Sanuye nickered loudly after them.
"Just keep and eye on everyone, Sanuye!" Celia called back as the lope broke into a canter, "I'll be back soon!"
The mare threw a look nervously towards the farm house, as if she could feel there was something wrong on the horizon and pinned her ears with a quiet whinny. The buckskin stud pressed into the twitching mare's side, nudging his nose into her jaw and nickering assuringly. The mare only pinned her ears further.
Dude...she conficasted his shit...I like "Rose Red" based by Stephen King, it's a good movie and a figure that Dean would be intrested enough to sit around and watch it. I know he's Jack Nicholson fan so sure and oh the Oprah...
The Planet Mary and All Her Woes...