Disclaimer: If I owned Supernatural, I would be both rich and famous. I am neither rich nor famous.
A/N: Sorry for the late update. I totally meant to post this on Thursday ... Friday ... Saturday ... but real life had other plans. The good news? I still plan on posting a chapter on Monday, so you'll get two chapters back to back! Yay! As per usual, apologies for mistakes, and for Bobby's foul mouth. There is actually rather a lot of cursing in this chapter...
Please review!
When Mary died, John wasn't prepared to take care of two young boys, much less a baby. Elizabeth took Sam for the weekend and just … never brought him back.
At the time, John thought it was for the best; sixteen years later, it seems it didn't much matter anyway.
"Valerie, I'm telling you, it wasn't me. That guy they're after? He isn't me."
"Then why'd you go for the gun? If you're so innocent, then why are you holding a gun on me, huh?" Valerie was glaring daggers. Sam had one of those if looks could kill moments.
Sam sighed. "Because you were going for the gun; I'm sorry I have to do this, but I really don't have time to deal with the police just now."
Valerie scoffed. She shifted her weight. Sam moved the gun just enough to remind her he was in charge.
"If you're innocent then why don't you want to talk to the police? If it were me, I'd be eager to get things cleared up as quickly as possible." She had a point. Too bad it wasn't that simple.
Sam started backing away. He knew she would call the cops the instant he left, but there really wasn't any help for that. He kept his gaze leveled with hers. "It's complicated." He said.
"Really? Seems pretty straightforward to me; you're wanted by the police, but you say they have the wrong man. Everything could be taken care of with a single phone call."
"Yeah, well, feel free to make that call; just as soon as I leave."
Valerie's eyes narrowed. "I will." She promised darkly.
Sam was at the door now. He glanced behind to check and make sure the street was deserted. That was a bad call.
Valerie body-slammed him – how she moved from behind the counter to right on top of him so quick Sam wasn't sure – sending Sam through the door and sprawling out into the street. The gun skittered away into the night. The sound of the glass shattering was enough to wake everybody on the block, and lights began to flicker on all around, coupled with angry shouts from unseen sources and demands to know what was going on.
Sam cursed and fumbled for his feet. Valerie was on him again just as he came fully upright, and damn but she didn't hit like a girl; at least not in the traditional sense.
All the air left Sam's lungs as a strong punch to his solar plexus landed, doubling him over. A sweeping blow to the back of his legs knocked him to the ground again. Valerie had obviously learned to fight somewhere, and she was kicking Sam's ass.
Sam hit the ground hard. He saw stars for a moment and everything swam in and out of focus. The streetlights, hardly bright enough to see by, were suddenly blinding as he tried to get his bearings. He shook the last of the fuzziness from his eyes just in time to react to another attack.
Valerie came at him with a kick. There was a moment, a tiny fragment in time, where she was balanced precariously on one leg; Sam seized that moment. He grabbed her foot, threw his body around, and scissored her supporting leg between both his of own. Even concussed and hurting, he couldn't forget his training, and rule number one had always been to never give in; even when you were beat, there was a chance … if you were willing to take it.
It was a testament to whatever training Valerie had obviously had that she didn't cry out when she fell, throwing her arms back in an attempt to break her fall. Something snapped when she landed, and Sam would bet her wrist was broken. It didn't seem to slow her down any.
Sam quickly disentangled himself from Valerie and rolled over and to his feet. He turned to face his adversary, but found her already up, smug grin stretched across her face, as though just waiting for Sam to attack again, maybe even hoping he would attack again, because she was sure she could take him down.
By now Sam was breathing hard, and his head ached like the worst hangover where it had collided with the asphalt. Even before fighting Valerie he had hurt pretty much all over from his run-in with the wild dogs, and this certainly wasn't helping matters. He gulped in air through lungs ragged with the efforts of the night, and tried not to let Valerie see how much trouble he was having staying on his feet.
Valerie had both hands up, right foot back, standing in a classic fighter's stance. "What's the matter; afraid to hit a girl?" she taunted. She took a clean step forward, keeping light on her feet. She was just mocking him now, Sam knew, and it was as annoying as it was disturbing. The girl was either crazy, or … well, crazy.
Sam took a mimicking step back, but it wasn't nearly as graceful as he would have liked. The concussion was throwing off his balance. "Not at all, but I try not to if I can help it; I do have some manners."
Valerie feinted right. Sam blocked her jab and moved to get her in a headlock, but she ducked.
A noise from across the street distracted Sam. Someone was coming; a door was thrown open and an angry yell sounded. Sam should have known better than to turn and look, but his reflexes were still sluggish and everything was hazy.
He saw a glimpse of a man in his thirties, clothed in only his neon green boxers, coming towards him at a run; then Valerie hit him.
This time, Sam didn't get back up.
XXX
As the fourth call rang out, finally going to voicemail, John Winchester's hand slammed into Bobby Singer's coffee table with enough force to knock the precarious stacks of research to the floor. No one blamed him; they were all on edge.
Dean sighed and rubbed a hand across stinging eyes. "Maybe something happened to him. You said he was on a hunt?" he half-turned to Bobby for confirmation.
Bobby grunted, his focus still on the cordless phone in his hand. It just wasn't like Sam to not answer his phone. If the boy was going to be somewhere he couldn't be reached or bothered, he turned it off; he never, never, in the nearly two years Bobby had known him, left it on but failed to pick up.
John was just as agitated as Bobby. He had never met this Sam Winchester; the last time he had seen Sam was when he was still little Sammy, crawling around in diapers. This Sammy, the one that Bobby knew, wasn't John's Sam … Mary's Sam … John didn't even know what this Sam looked like, or what he liked to eat. The only thing he knew was Sam's birthday – May second – and that he had Mary's eyes.
But this was still his son, by blood and by this feeling of slowly suffocating as scenarios played out in John's head of what might have happened on the other end of the unresponsive cell phone.
Desperate for a distraction, John turned his thoughts to what might have led Sam to where he was now.
Bobby said Sam was trained well, and everything he didn't already know he absorbed like a sponge. That sounded like the Sam John remembered from holidays at Elizabeth's … holidays he stopped attending years ago when it became more than clear the kid was better off where he was.
With a sigh, John carefully steered his thoughts away from that track as well, knowing it would only lead to what ifs no one could answer.
So the kid was a fast learner, and a damn good hunter, even at his young age. From what Bobby had said, more in-between-the-lines than the outright facts he gave, John summarized that Bobby had not taught Sam about the Supernatural, which meant that someone else had.
John didn't think it was Elizabeth. Elizabeth hated the hunting life, and there was no way she'd expose Sam to any part of it. Of course, Elizabeth still had friends who hunted; John remembered one in particular Mary and Eliza had both been close to, though at the time they told him they met at a creative writing seminar. That was before John knew anything about his wife's previous way of life, but after Mary's death Elizabeth filled him in on everything she knew about the supernatural, including all of her contacts in the hunting world.
"Bobby …" John kept his gaze fixed on the rug, a part of him still lost in his thoughts. "Do you know anyone named Lauren Richards? She's a hunter; not sure where she's living now, but she used to be based out of Lawrence." John didn't voice what was quite clearly implied; she knew Mary.
Bobby sighed deeply. "Yeah, I know of her."
John looked up at the hesitance in Bobby's tone. "That's good." He said slowly. "Do you know where she is now?" he asked hopefully.
The trucker's hat came off and started twisting in Bobby's hands. "Yeah," Bobby said again, his voice heavy with sadness.
John was about to press further, though he could guess where this was going, when Bobby spoke again.
"I helped bury her 'bout seven months ago; killed by a Wendigo."
There was silence for a minute that dragged into five. The only sound was the clock ticking and Jack whining softly in his sleep. It happened all the time; being a hunter was pretty much an advance on your death certificate. But they all observed a moment of stillness for a fallen comrade.
Dean cleared his throat, drawing sharp glances from both John and Bobby. "Why, uh, why do you need to know about her, Dad? Who is she?" he asked curiously.
John shook his head. "I thought she might be able to lead us to Sam, but obviously not."
"Wait …" Bobby put his hat back on slowly, his eyes unfocused as he thought.
John and Dean waited with something that might loosely be described as patience until Bobby finally looked up. The weathered hunter was grinning brilliantly; the expression caused both other men to pause, unused to the … twinkle, for lack of a better word, that filled his eyes as he radiated pure triumph.
Without a word, Bobby jumped up and ran from the room, knocking a two-hundred year-old tome to the floor in his haste without bothering to pick it up.
With a muttered curse, John followed, Dean on his heels all the way up the stairs. The extremely un-Bobby-like behavior had them both more than a little concerned. Possession wasn't just something they did in the movies when you were a hunter, and John was about two steps away from splashing his friend with holy water and praying like hell to anyone listening that Bobby wouldn't react, except maybe with annoyance at being wet and anger that John could be such a 'damn idjit'.
They found Bobby in the back bedroom, the one Dean usually slept in when they stayed the night and which doubled as a sort of office in the meantime.
"Singer!" John snapped, hanging on the doorframe as he leaned in. "What the hell is going on?"
Bobby turned to look at the Winchester men crowding the doorway; he was still grinning. "Found it!" he announced. Before John or Dean could ask, Bobby muscled his way past them and back down the stairs, his guests following with less than good grace at all the cryptic secrecy.
"Bobby, what is going on?" Dean asked, once they were back where they had started.
Bobby just waved him off, snatching the phone from the coffee table and punching in a number. John would have demanded to know what Bobby was up to, but his friend held up a hand to silence him. John sat down heavily on the couch, sinking into the cushions; no point in being uncomfortable, because this was probably going to take a while. Dean followed suit, though with less acceptance than his father; his leg bounced as he sat perched on the armrest, eyes glued to the back of Bobby's head.
After two rings someone picked up on the other end of the line, and Bobby's grin dropped away, replaced by the scowl they were all more familiar with.
"Quincy! You damn, frikin', retarded idjit! What the hell have you done now, you jackass!"
John's eyebrows shot up. Dean glanced across to his father, but John shook his head; he didn't know any Quincy, either.
Quincy said something, but he wasn't speaking loudly enough for John or Dean to overhear. Bobby listened for a few seconds, and then cut him off. "No, you listen, you piece of cockroach shit! I told you to take care of it, not send a kid in after 'em!"
John stood. Some hunter had sent his son after … what? He stepped into Bobby's line of sight, holding his hand out for the phone. Bobby shook his head and turned away.
"I told ya they were!" Bobby growled. He let out a stream of profanities that had even John impressed. "Yeah, well, that's what happens when yer a damn idjit, ya damn idjit!" a slight pause as Quincy defended himself, then – "Well, where is he now? And don't you dare say you don't know!"
Three minutes to let Bobby sort things out seemed more than generous in John Winchester's faintly panicked mind, and he took a resolute step forward, intent on seizing the phone and finding out for himself just what the hell was going on.
Bobby abruptly cursed again, pulling the phone from his ear even as the sounds of Quincy pleading for advice and leniency drifted through. Before John could make a grab for the phone, it was turned off and thrown onto the couch.
"Damn cordless things," Bobby growled, "not nearly as satisfyin' to hang up when there's nothin' ta slam."
"Bobby!" John yelled. Singer turned to him, one eyebrow lifted in surprise. "Would you please tell me who that was? And where is Sam?"
Bobby hesitated, eyes roving the room, landing on a diagram for a charm against dybbuk possession hanging on the far wall. After a moment, he sighed and leveled his gaze with John's. "Quincy is a hunter, young an' headstrong, but not a bad egg, far as I know. I told 'im about a cult that's been growin' over in Ingrid. I woulda taken care of it myself, but I've been busy with that haunting an' this needed to be done before the next three-quarter moon. Quincy said he'd take care of it."
"And?" John prodded.
"And," Bobby continued with another sigh, "He told Sam to check it out. Said he was busy with his own hunt, and Sam was willin' an' eager to get right to it, so he let 'im."
Both of the older men fell silent, thinking on the implications of an inexperienced kid like Sam going up against a cult by himself. The odds weren't good.
"Well, what are we waiting for?" Dean demanded, breaking the tense silence. "Let's haul ass to Ingrid!"
TBC
