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NINE

Crescent Hill Library
Louisville, Kentucky
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
10:34 AM

There was no deterring Sam whenever something had sparked his interest, Dean knew, but that didn't stop him from being annoyed. After driving them to the closest library—the one the Filson had listed as a temporary house for all its books while their archives were being remodeled—Dean found himself face-to-face with an overzealous little brother and a pile of musty old journals that he had a feeling would crumble in his hands.

Sam hadn't explained what he was looking for. All he had said in the heat of his fervor was that Dean should start reading. He had a feeling Sam had only told him that to keep him busy while his brother searched feverishly though book after book, pushing each aside carelessly after he was finished with it. The librarian had told them that the bindings on the volumes were fragile and should be handled with precaution, but Sam seemed to be throwing that to the wind as he quickly scanned the pages of handwritten material for some unspeakable piece of information.

Shutting the journal Sam had placed in front of him—which further instilled his suspicion that his brother was giving him busy work seeing as it was dated decades before the sanitarium had been constructed—Dean looked out the walls of the glass-enclosed "Quiet Room" the old woman behind the desk had given them upon the flash of a badge: A few people were meandering the aisles, but not many. Most of the activity was contained in the children's section, where they had heard the beginning lines of The Velveteen Rabbit being read aloud to a group of kids upon entering.

Sam hadn't wasted any time as soon as he had pushed through the thick, wooden front doors of the library, immediately heading to the circular information center in the middle of the room that housed the woman who had given them some of the Filson's archives. She had the look and smell of a quintessential librarian with gray hair wrapped into a bun, an oversized cardigan, and layers upon layers of powdery perfume. Even though they were across the library and inside a separate room, Dean could still smell her musk. The odor was, if possible, worse than the o-zone wafting from the corpse of Detective Welby, and definitely more potent.

But the woman, who later introduced herself as Patty, was nice enough. Upon seeing their FBI badges, she hadn't asked questions and instead turned on heel to enter a private section across the floor. Before disappearing, she had offered them "Quiet Room One", as she called it, and told them she'd be back with what they were looking for as soon as she could find it. It took her ten minutes—ten long minutes of Sam's impatient finger tapping and lip biting—until she returned with boxes the size of filing cabinet drawers, three in all. Sam had overly thanked her, probably glad to finally get the ball rolling, before watching her walk away and tossing the first journal he didn't deem his toward Dean—who then just rolled his eyes, opened it, and decided not to say anything. Sam didn't seem to be in a sharing mood.

Glancing at his brother, Dean saw that Sam had stopped racing through texts to carefully read a page in front of him. After a few more moments, a smile broke out on his brother's face. "Found it."

"About damn time," Dean scoffed, placing the journal he hadn't read back in the box.

That had earned him a glare from Sam.

"What'd you find?" Dean groaned under the weight of his brother's gaze. "The map to Mordor? A way to get to Narnia? What?"

"You read?" Sam asked with a raised eyebrow and the touch of a grin.

"I saw the movies," Dean admitted with a shrug. "Anyway, what did you find that you needed to be so secretive about? Because whatever it is, it better be damn worth me sitting here bored out of my skull for the past half an hour."

Sam bit his lip. "Sorry. But I didn't want to say anything until I was sure. It was just a theory at first, but now that I think about it, I should have seen it sooner."

"Seen what sooner?"

"Okay," Sam said, clearing his throat in that way that told Dean a long lecture was about to spill out of his brother's mouth. "Remember back at the Filson when that guy who named himself after two presidents—"

"That was what was so funny to you? You need a new sense of humor."

Sam narrowed his eyes at being interrupted and mocked. "Theodore Roosevelt and William McKinley were the presidents in office around the turn of the century, and when the Filson was first constructed. It was written on the same brochure that said this library was housing their—"

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Forget I said anything."

"Anyway," Sam smirked, "before we bailed, he said something that struck me. Remember when he said that when the first nurse died in room 502, a curse was placed on the hospital?" Dean nodded during Sam's pause, not wanting to further irritate his brother by interrupting him again. "Well, I remembered reading in one of Dad's books a long time ago that when a witch is killed, a curse manifests itself in the place of their murder."

"Right," Dean frowned, suddenly understanding where Sam was going with this. "Like that thing in Dad's journal about that guy that died during the Salem Witch Trials—"

"Giles Corey," Sam supplied.

"Yeah, him. He was murdered and now everyone says he shows up whenever shit hits the fan, right? Like that fire in Salem in 1914?"

Sam bit his lip. "Something like that. Some people believe he started it since his ghost was spotted the night before it happened."

Dean sighed and tugged on his earlobe. "But the woman in 502 hung herself."

"Maybe, maybe not," Sam said, straightening up. Dean knew this motion all too well. He was about to get an ear-full of information that would either be interesting or boring. With Sam, it was a fifty-fifty shot—though whatever his brother deemed fascinating usually caused Dean to fall asleep. "I was thinking about it on the way over here. What if the woman hadn't hung herself because she was pregnant like everyone says? What if she was hung and everyone used that as a cover story? I mean, it would make sense."

"Like what, they went all Crucible on Rosemary's Baby?"

"Well, yeah. Think about it, Dean: her employee files and hospital records were destroyed. Even in those days, if someone hung themselves in the building, they would have had to keep everything for insurance purposes and for the police investigation. If a group of people strung her up, they would've gotten rid of all the evidence that would point fingers."

Dean frowned, not entirely convinced that Sam's theory was legitimate. The employee files and hospital records could have been destroyed after the cops and insurance companies were done. The tour guide at the Filson had said that hanging yourself back in those days was still considered "sin", and it was possible that the rest of the staff didn't want to condemn themselves by holding onto evidence of the nurse's actions. "I don't know…"

"I do," Sam said, biting his lip and taking a minute to dig through the piles of papers in front of him before retrieving a journal that looked exactly like the one Dean had neglected. "Check this out."

Pushing the aged book toward his brother, Sam gave Dean an expectant glare as Dean held the volume carefully in his hands. The pages were covered with minute cursive in a faded purple ink, some of it so transparent that it was hard to make out a few of the paragraphs. Scanning the handwriting a few times, he finally landed on what Sam wanted him to read:

Friday, June 19, 1936

A horrible event happened on the fifth floor today. The body of a nurse I have been prohibited to mention by name has been "discovered", and everyone is describing the death as suicide.

I spoke with Miss Edwards, who claims to have recovered the body, and she told me in secret that her warden was owed such a terrible punishment. When I asked the meaning behind such an ominous suggestion, she told me nothing more than to rid the hospital of the woman's apparent evil

Placing the journal back on the tabletop, Dean scoffed. "People, man."

"Tell me about it," Sam agreed with a small grimace. "Anyway, I think that's when the story of the woman hanging herself spread. Sometimes people are dumb enough to convince themselves that what they see or did wasn't what happened, so the story probably stuck with ease."

"Yeah, like that time in Pennsylvania with that demon that took over the plane. By the time we got off, everyone was convinced they had just experienced some really bad turbulence." Dean smiled, recalling the memory. "Again, I say: people, man."

Sam frowned. "Yeah, well, that's not all there is to it. When the curse was placed on the hospital after her death, I think there was more to it than the traditional pox-on-your-house variety."

"What?"

"Shakespeare," Sam scowled.

"Sorry, I don't speak nerd," Dean mumbled, rolling his eyes.

Sam glowered in response, but didn't acknowledge the comment. Instead, he pushed the books in front of him aside, digging for the familiar one at the bottom. The brown leather cover of Dad's journal became unearthed a minute later, and Dean waited while Sam flipped through it before speaking. "Have you ever heard of the Timor Animi?"

Dean raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that a Japanese cartoon?"

"That's anime," Sam smirked.

"Oh. Then, no."

Turning his attention to Dad's journal, Sam paused to scan their father's scribbled writing before reading an excerpt aloud. "'Timor Animi, Latin for "the fear feeling" or "fear of the mind" is a sensation left behind by the spirit of a witch who died a particularly violent death. It is said that the effects of the Animi can be felt centuries after the deceased has passed and will not relent until after being put to rest. The phenomenon is frequently sensed by everyone, but stronger by those often in the presence of the supernatural. Psychics, mediums, and the clairvoyant are usually arrested in motion the closer they are to the convergence of the Animi—typically found in the spot the departed drew their final breath."

"So that's why you froze?" Dean asked with a contented sigh, glad that his brother's sudden cease in motion was due to something all weird-o psychics felt and not some sign that the spirit haunting Waverly Hill was interested in Sam.

"Try not to sound too happy," Sam grimaced. "There's more to it. It goes on to say that if one of these things is present where a haunting occurs, it amps up the power the spirit has, probably giving it enough juice to go wherever it wants."

"Yeah, but the ghost of a witch can do that anyway. What I don't get is why it's only choosing certain people to go after," Dean said, shifting in his chair. "I mean, you how I said in that movie The Grudge the ghost follows everyone that goes inside the house home? Why's it just choosing those two girls and not us? Why didn't it go after those other two teenagers?"

"Well, usually spirits haunt people they have a connection to. We must be missing something when it comes to Terri and the detective."

Suddenly, Dean's watch began to beep, signaling that it was eleven o'clock. Grabbing some of the papers and books off the desk, he began to toss them into the boxes to his right, not bothering to place them inside gently. Sam did the same, only this time using the precaution the librarian had ordered to lower the fragile volumes into their storage bins. When they were done, Dean placed the lids on both and picked his suit jacket up from the back of the chair where he had carelessly slung it upon entering.

"You boys find what you were looking for?" Patty asked as the two of them walked past her desk and toward the front door.

"Yes, thank you," Sam replied with a genial smile.

The librarian returned the grin before heading to the room the brothers had just abandoned. Dean caught a glimpse of the woman carrying one of the boxes out of the glass enclosure before pushing open the heavy, wooden doors leading to the parking lot.