Well, kind of nervous about this one and you'll see why, I do believe. I worked hard on this chapter and there's quite a bit of action in it. Just hold onto your hat.
As is customary now: Let's make a list of all the things I do not own in this story and my intentions. I do not own Sam or Dean. I do not own any of the names and have nothing against or for the ones I picked. I do not own the personality types. I do not own plot types or the idea of Dean and Sam not knowing each other. I do not intend to offend, insult or hurt anyone by writing this. I do not own any of the plotlines of season one, two, three, or four of Supernatural. This is a non-profit story, not meant to do anything but entertain those few golden souls who read it and use massive spurts of inspiration a sixteen-year old mind gets so they do not drive her insane. The one thing I do own, in fact, is combining these elements in the way I do. So please, don't sue.
All introductions, explanations, and witty banter aside, when all was said and done, Sam looked much more prepared to believe in Jason's crazy idea than Dean did. He was somewhat put off by the fact that the younger boy was willing to buy such a ludicrous story so fast, but maybe it wasn't so crazy…
What the hell was Dean thinking! Of course it was crazy. Dingo-ate-my-baby-crazy. Batshit insane. Dean spent the next few minutes as Jason and Sam continued going over the finer points of stuff Dean already knew coming up with some rather funny names for just how crazy this whole thing was. Monsters didn't exist. They were just stories told to terrify small children and teach them lessons about wandering off late at night or telling lies or just being plain old bad. Ghosts and spirits and poltergeists were the stuff of legend and cheap b-rated movies. None of that stuff actually ever happened, right?
But then why did he have this nagging déjà vu feeling swelling in his heart?
And if none of what Jason was saying was real, if he really was just some random nutter, than what had attacked Dean and Jake in the classroom?
And possibly most troubling is why did it look like Mr. Science-Geek-Big-Brains was actually buying it?
Dean wondered for a moment if the world had simply gone mad and let a big gob of spit out onto the floor to test and see if gravity was still working. Nope, still didn't float back up and hit him in the eye. The world was still spinning. Maybe. How do you even tell if it is or not for sure?
Dean heaved a great sigh and cast a sidelong glance to where Jake lay, shivering faintly. Figures he'd have developed a fever on top of everything else that was going on. They couldn't wait any longer damn it! Jake was a bustard, even Dean could openly admit that. But no one deserved to die in a school kitchen. Extremely undignified. Even if somehow this were all real, then what were they still doing just sitting there on their asses while Sam and Jason debated and Dean was ready to rip his already short hair out? He cleared his throat and both other men looked at him.
"Alright and dandy guys, but is anyone else extremely bored being stuck in a school kitchen? I never had any desire to find out how they fix the gruel they call food around here nor do I want to continue examining the linoleum. So I got a question worth asking. Now that we're here, what the hell are we going to do?"
Jason rolled his eyes and muttered something like "You always were a big pain in the ass." Then he stood up and took on a real formal tone Dean had heard thousands of times from teachers and Sam. But unlike the pair of those, something about the elder man made Dean actually want to listen. "This shouldn't be too much harder than just a run of the mill salt and burn. Although I can guarantee we're going to have a hell of a pissed off spirit to deal with. And someone's going to have to stay here and watch him." Jason hitched his thumb to Jake.
"I'll go, you stay here." Both Sam and Dean replied simultaneously. Dean clenched his jaw. There was no way he was going to let this little idiot get his ass hurt. Something about Sam's eyes suggested he was thinking something similar.
"Look Sam, you're younger and I don't want this to end with you in the hospital. You're not getting hurt as long as I can do something about it."
"And you're blood's less precious than mine?" Sam fumed
"Yes."
"Listen, I'm tired of people trying to treat me like I'm some delicate baby. I can handle myself. Besides, what do I do if he wakes up? He's exactly in my fan club." Dean picked up a pot from the shelf and gestured whacking Jake flat on his face with it. "Dean! No, I'm not going to hit him!"
"Why not? It's not like it's the first time he's ever been hit or anything."
"Listen boys, what I need is someone who knows where the cemetery is. Whoever can tell me that can come." Jason said diplomatically.
"It's across from the church, three blocks from here." Both said at the same time again. Dean scowled at Sam, whose eyes shot just as many daggers back.
"Alright, only one way to settle this." Dean stated.
"Oh no, not Rock, Paper, Scissors, come on! What are we, eight?"
"Rock, Paper, Scissors solves all, Sammy."
"Stop calling me that." Sam hissed.
"Make me!"
"You two are being like five year olds, just play the bloody game already or I'm leaving you BOTH here." Neither boy noticed the smirk on Jason's face, barely concealed by a hand feigning a cough. Jason's threat, however, didn't sit idly with either boy.
"Rock beats Scissors, Dean."
"What are you talking about? That's a paper."
"Sure….cause a moment a go, it looked clearly like a scissors."
"My fingers are stiff. Redo!"
"You've just been de-aged again."
"Damn it! Two out of three!"
"Dean, I won again, we can't keep playing."
"Yes we can!"
"Until what?"
"Until I win!"
"That'll never happen, you're too predictable."
"Sure I am. One more? Winner takes all?"
"Whatever Dean…."
"You cheated!"
"Dean, you always do the same one. Always scissors."
"Oh….right." Dean flushed. How had he just been beaten by a fourteen year old? He hissed, hating the idea of Sam going out there with that thing. He hadn't quite yet figured out why it mattered so much. After all, just their rock paper scissors game was a clear testament to how Dean felt about the boy. All of his over intelligence, maturity, and perfectionism would be annoying on anyone else and it was. It really, really was.
But then, what Jason had said flashed across his mind. He didn't tell Sam when they had been talking earlier. And maybe that was for the best. Dean still hadn't completely ruled out the idea that Jason might just be plain nuts. How could they in any universe be related? Much less brothers.
"Dean," Jason had a look of the upmost seriousness, passing him a shotgun. "You need to take this. If that ghost gets within a few feet of you, you…"
"Yeah Yeah, I shoot Casper the-not-so-friendly, right?"
Sam pursed his lips. "Listen, just don't do anything stupid. Stay here and wait for us to come back genius. No heroics. I don't particularly want to be burying you; no matter how much of a pain in the ass you are."
As Sam and Jason left together, Dean bent out some of his anger by kicking the door. Sam should be here, not him! Sam was too young to be rushing into anything dangerous. And too important. He had a whole future ahead of him, but Dean…this was probably the best gig he could get. He realized faintly that "hunting" as Jason had called it was the only way he would ever make something good out of himself.
Suddenly, he realized how cold it was in here and looked down. By kicking the door, Dean had inadvertently broken the salt line! He spun around on his heels and the sight he saw would likely haunt him forever. Floating lightly by the table was not one, but two ghosts, hovering over Jake who was wildly convulsing.
One of them spun toward him, barring inhuman, pearly white teeth and red-tinted brown eyes. The ghost jerked his head and all of the knives from one of the holders rose into the air before hurling themselves towards Dean. Dean only just managed to dive behind the cupboard, one of the knives clipping his arm and drawing blood. He took aim toward the one who attacked him and fired.
The ghost dissipated in a puff of smoke and the other one growled at him before getting shot as well. Dean dove for the door, leveling the salt to cover the whole threshold. Satisfied, he got on his haunches, only to find himself staring at a mildew leg of blue jean staring him in the face.
The smaller boy grasped his shoulders, staring into his eye for half a second before sending him flying into the air, the rifle slipping from his grasp. He raced to reach it again, only to find the other ghost, stepping on his fingers and pulling him to his feet by his hair. He hissed loudly, desperately trying to find something to help him out of this situation.
There, just a few inches from his reach was a canister of salt! Dean desperately fought to reach it as the ghost got a firm grip on his neck, attempted to snuff the life from him. With a final desperate reach, he yanked the salt up and splashed a handful at the ghost holding him. It quickly dissipated, sending Dean sprawling to the floor. Seeing spots, he crawled and quickly got his rifle back. He took aim at the other and pulled the trigger.
With both temporarily dissipated, he ran to the other half of the room and quickly poured a new line. Both ghosts stood on one end, just staring, their ever open reddish eyes a maelstrom of anger.
Before he forgot, he pulled out his cell phone, punched in Sam's number and waited. It rung once, twice, three times, four, and finally on the fifth ring a familiar voice came on the line.
"Dean?"
"Sam! Thank God you answered." Dean told Sam what happened after Jason and he left.
"Dude, only you could get in that much trouble in like ten minutes." Sam sighed after he was done. Dean didn't bother objecting; it was kind of true. "So the other boy, he's probably Jesse, Alex's brother. We'll have to burn them both."
"Yeah, I figured. Just be careful, okay? Both of them look beyond pissed."
Sam hung up the phone, quickly informing Jason that they needed to dig up two graves now. Said older man groaned loudly.
"Okay, so here's how we're going to do this. I need you to cover me. Chances are when they realize what we're up to, they'll try and stop us; especially since there's two."
"Right," Replied Sam, feeling rather like a civilian charging off into battle without a sword or a speck of armor. Sam knew he should be in every sense of the word freaking out right now, but he was eerily calm. The same had happened when Jason was telling him about hunting. Something just naturally clicked. Faint surges of recognition and memories splashed through his mind; a half remembered world he once knew. One of terror and thrill, of cheep diner food and lumpy motel mattresses, of saving lives and making a difference.
As they pulled up to the graveyard, Sam felt his heart give a surge of protest. It was a place he'd past a hundred times and he'd never been too queasy before. How had he missed the way the air seemed to still as they passed over the threshold of the gate? The way many of the crypts and tombs seemed too worn to read properly; how the light didn't quite seem to reach the cold earth. True enough, this was the first time he really spent much time here. He knew Eric sometimes went here on weekends, paying respects to his mother. But Sam had never gone with him, nor had he been here long enough to have someone he knew and cared for die. True enough his foster parents brought him to church every Sunday, but he'd never actually bothered to stray behind the church into the cemetery.
"We're going to need to try and find where their plots are. You take the west side, I'll take east. You find their graves, holler for me, okay?" Jason asked, a shovel slung skillfully over his back. He noticed how worried the younger boy looked and gave him a pat on the shoulder. "Don't worry, I've done my homework. There's nothing in this graveyard cept maybe those two ghosts. And for the moment they are more interested in Dean."
Sam nodded but still clutched his rifle tightly to his chest. He began examining the newer looking gravestones he came across. He figured they were only looking for newer stones, since Alex and Jesse only died about a year ago. He carefully picked his way around the gravestones, trying not to walk on the spots where the bodies were buried.
He then spied a pair of gravestones. But it wasn't so much that they looked the right age or anything; in fact, they were densely shrouded by rich green plants. There were buds running up the stalks of each of the plants. Their leaves were razor edged and if Dean were here, Sam knew he would be snarkily comparing it to a marijuana leaf. Part of him was drawn towards the herbs; the same part that seemed relaxed and at ease in the graveyard. Relenting to trust this hidden instinct, Sam walked over to the graves with trepidation.
The learned part of his mind identified the plant as he drew closer. It was wormwood, a plant associated with the dead, particularly the risen dead. How he knew that last tidbit was anyone's guess. He reached his hand out, gently brushing the plants aside to read the text beneath. "Alex Rhemes, Jesse Rhemes." He read aloud.
"Jason! I found them!" He shouted, seeing the other man about fifty feet away. Jason strode toward him; having little trouble clearing the distance between them. He mussed Sam's hair. "Good job, Sam. Now keep on watch." Jason sighted the wormwood and with a spray of gasoline, he set the plants covering the markers on fire. "Wormwood enhances their ability to retain shape and gives them power." He explained. Sam nodded, watching as the plants were reduced to charred cinders.
He dug his spade deep into Alex's grave and began digging. Sam was somewhat surprised at how easily the other man worked. He made it look like he was doing nothing more than little bits of garden work.
Sam suddenly found himself flying through the air, slamming against a half broken tombstone which crumbled as he hit it. Pain shot through his back, but he had somehow managed to keep hold of his shotgun. The eerie figure of one of the spirits encroached on the fallen boy, malice in his red tinged eyes. Panicked and bleary eyed, he tried to take aim but found it was next to impossible with the dots and stars dancing across his vision.
Then a gunshot rang out and the ghost dissolved onto the wind like a cloud of foul smoke. Jason's torso up to a little bellow his hips was visable from the grave, his own shotgun slowly lowering. "You okay, Sam?" He called out.
A little embarrassed that he'd been ambushed so easily, Sam called out an affirmative as he got up. A little dizzy, but everything save his pride was still intact. "Don't worry, it happens to the best of us. Just watch for when he or his brother comes back, okay?"
Sam nodded, keeping a keen eye after that. Every prickle on the back of his neck made him jump, ready to fire. He whipped around and found it was only a tree quaking in protest of a light wind that had picked up. He reprimanded himself for being so trigger happy. "Be alert, not a spaz," he told himself under his breath and then returned to his vigil.
There was a cold sensation coming from his side and he spun around. Instinct took over and for the first time he could remember, Sam fired the rifle. The spirit hissed and popped out of existence just before the salt round hit him. He heard something stir to his behind and fired again, this time it caught his target.
As he heard a clang on wood sound, it faintly registered that Jason had reached the coffin. Suddenly, both boys were standing on either side of the grave, looking as if they were ready to rip out Jason's spleen and feed it to the mice wandering the boneyard. Sam fired at one, but before he could reload and hit the other, the ghost flickered and disappeared.
Jason had managed to pull himself out of the grave and was hastily pouring lighter fluid and salt across Alex's bones when Sam heard another crack above him. Foolishly, he thought it was just the wind stirring the branch again.
Whether it was a final protest of Alex before he burst into flames behind Sam or Jesse avenging his brother or even just really rotted roots, Jason didn't know. All he knew was one second, Sam seemed to have gotten a handle on shooting the vengeful spirits, the next there was an awesome crack and the oak tree right behind Sam slammed to the ground, taking the smaller boy with it. Jason was far enough away only to get whipped by branches, drawing blood to his face. But he wasn't close enough to rip the youngest Winchester out of the way before the massive tree trunk crushed him.
Horrified, Jason ripped the branches off of him, not caring to assess how badly his face was whipped. He launched himself over the trunk, screaming at the top of his lungs, "SAM! SAMMY! SAM!"
The younger boy was in a dazed state of half consciousness when he reached his side. Blood was dribbling from his lips in gobs, suggesting some serious lung damage. Jason had no idea what to do. If he moved the tree, he risked further injuring Sam. But if Sam didn't get out soon, he would suffocate.
In a split decision, Jason lifted the tree somehow, his muscles bulging with effort. With a miraculous heave, he pushed it completely off the boy. But his victory was short-lived. Sam looked like a pancake, one of his ribs sticking out of his skin grotesquely. If he had to guess, he'd have said several other bones were broken. The only part of him that looked remotely decent were his legs, flecked with blood, scratches, and bruises, but unharmed otherwise.
"Son-of-a-bitch!" Jason yelled. He spied Jesse out of the corner of his eye and shot him twice for good measure, the second round cracking a good piece off a headstone. His mind screamed that he needed to get Sam to the hospital desperately, but it was still risky moving him and if he called in the professionals, there would be too many awkward questions and not to mention digging up Jesse would be out of question.
Sam was bleeding so rapidly, there wasn't too much of a choice. His heart thudded in his chest; every second was Sam's life slipping away. He punched in Dean's number, mentally preparing himself for the earful he was going to get from Dean.
"Dean?"
"Yeah?"
"Something happened…I need you to come to the graveyard asap."
"What's going on?"
"Just come! Now! Time's of the essence. I won't be here when you get here most likely. I need you to dig up the second grave and salt and burn the bones. Leave Jake where he is."
"How will I know which one?"
Just look for the massive fucking tree and the pool of blood, that should set you straight. Jason held his tongue. "Believe me, you'll know." He said, deciding to play it cryptic. "And fill both of them in too, okay?"
"Yeah yeah yeah I hear you old man."
"I am't old." Jason hissed. "Just get here." He snapped the phone shut and loped to the gate. The whole while long his mind was filling with images of what he might find when he comes back. That would be unbearable, and impossible for him to imagine. He started his car, almost not even bothering getting out and pushing the gate more open. But if he wanted Dean to complete the job, he needed to try and keep things as quiet as possible. As if it really mattered. Who wasn't going to notice the blood or the tree or the open grave? It wasn't like they did this at night or anything, which was probably not the most intelligent idea.
Sam was out completely when he got there. He nervously felt for a pulse; rewarded with a faint thum thum, thum thum. He gently rolled Sam onto a blanket, grimancing at how pale the boy looked and how much blood covered the grass.
"SAMMY!" a voice cut the air and Jason felt his own heart almost stop. Evidently Dean had taken more haste in getting here than he had seemed to have wanted to when they talked. The other boy was frantically racing to him. A moment later, he was hovering over him, asking so many questions at once it sounded like gibberish to Jason's ears.
"Listen Dean!" He cut him off. "I'll talk to you about it later. Right now he needs to get to a hospital. Help me lift a side of the blanket and get him into the back." That shut Dean up instantly and he gently helped get his younger brother into the car.
Jason could tell the worry in his eye was genuine, raw fear. Not for himself, for the little brother Jason knew he had not yet fully acknowledged. He had told Dean about who he was because he sensed the other boy needed to have a head start on Sam. Dean needed to be the one who told his younger about their blood relation; to rediscover what he had always had. The one thing that seemed to matter most to him. Sam, on the other hand, would not have much of an issue accepting who he was. And in fact, if Dean took too long, the clever boy might just figure it out himself. But Jason knew there was something far heavier, a much more cruel burden, which would be placed on Sam's shoulders.
But for now, as Dean lowered his younger into the front seat, Jason realized if he left the salt and burn to the other man, it wouldn't get done right in Dean's haste to see his brother. "You go on ahead, Dean. I'll finish up here and meet you there."
Dean instantly slid himself into the driver's seat, Sam's lolling head on his lap, and with a screech he tore out of the cemetery, hitting at least one gravestone on the way.
Dean had been in and out of the hospital several times. Whether because one of his friends got seriously hurt doing something stupid or because of some overdose on his part and even once, the night his foster parents kicked him out, for a suicide attempt. He'd drank and drank and drank and then he did something he had never even tried before. He slit his wrists. Jake had found him just after he passed out and, bandaging his wrists to protect him from dying from blood loss, he drove him to the hospital. There they treated him without much of a word. Of course, some shrink still managed to come see him, but gave up when he realized all he was going to get from Dean was sarcastic comments.
The whole way to the hospital was a blur. He was on auto-pilot. Just driving while keeping one hand just under Sam's chin, his sensitive fingers begging for a pulse. And it did beat, weaker and weaker the longer went by, but it still beat. And then, just as he made the turn off to the hospital, there was nothing.
"NO! NONONO! DON'T YOU GO GIVING UP ON ME! NOT NOW! COME ON YOU LITTLE BITCH! BEAT!" He slammed on the gas, pulling into the emergency lot. "SOMEBODY HELP ME! HE CAN'T DIE!"
*Whimpers* Please don't kill me. It just kind of came, like many of my plot twists. Origionally didn't intend for something like this, but it provides a perfect chance for me to arrange the rest of the wild ideas in my head. Get them to obey me a little bit more maybe.
Anyways, so enjoy the little cliffie. And remember, reviews might just help Sam's heart start again.
