The itching stopped. Reneey blinked, and then shrugged. Lyn just had to find a way to contact her, some way; but how? She didn't have her cell phone, Sam did. How else could she talk over long distances?
"Hey, Dean, stop where you found Lyn's cell!"
"Why?"
"Just do it!" Reneey snapped.
So Dean drove over to where the mound of dirt had been; there wasn't really a better place to start, after all. They all got out of the car and Reneey ran to the pile of dirt, but stopped dead at the sight of something red.
Suddenly Reneey fell over.
No, it couldn't be, Lyn thought as she watched through the crystal ball. No... that's impossible, she can't feel pain.. but...
"Crap," Lyn exhaled harshly, her voice hardly more than a croak now. Just because she can't feel it doesn't mean it's not there...
"She's poisoned," she muttered hoarsely. "That infernal idiot, he POISONED her!"
Then she suddenly started to shake with anger instead of cold, the fist that wasn't in a cast clenched until her fingernails were digging out blood. Then she opened her mouth and let out a strange sound somewhere between a growl and a strangled cry, which if she had been able to speak properly would undoubtedly have been a yell of fury.
Meanwhile, Reneey was lying on the ground, blinking and muttering, "Erm.. okaaay..." She started coughing, and Sam and Dean rushed over to where she was. There was blood coming out of her mouth.
"Holy shit! Is this, like, a side effect of not feeling pain?" Reneey wondered.
Then something green came out with her coughing along with the blood.
"Reneey," Sam said slowly, "you've been poisoned!"
"Ooh," Reneey said, looking up. "Um.. awesome?"
Lyn twitched as she heard those words through the crystal ball. She had a sudden desire to give Reneey a big, hard slap upside the head. But, Lyn thought hopefully, maybe now that Sam and Dean knew that Reneey had been poisoned, they could help her.
"Sam," Dean said, instantly taking charge, "you stay here while I take Reneey back to the hospital."
"Whoo, I'm feeling fine! Seriously, see, no more..." Then she coughed again, and more blood sprayed her face.
Dean picked her up and said firmly, "No arguments." Then he went back to the Impala with Reneey.
"Jesus, Lyn, where ARE you?" Sam wondered aloud. Then something else came into his mind. "Forest demons," he muttered. "They like deep, damp places.. and there's only one place around here that's deep and damp..."
Suddenly he yelled, "I KNOW WHERE SHE IS!"
Dean and Reneey were already gone by this point, and so Sam went alone to find the place he had thought of -- a small cave that led into a bigger one. As he walked, he called Dean.
"Yeah?" Dean's voice asked.
"I know where Lyn is," Sam said hurriedly. "There's a cave, near Park Avenue. Come here as fast as you can."
He didn't wait for an answer, just hung up and set his jaw before beginning the descent into the cave.
It seemed like forever that Sam was crawling, but really it was only about twenty minutes. Finally he was able to stand up straight, then took a step and promptly fell through a hole that had been covered with mud and leaves. Picking himself up, he looked around at the walls; there were doors all around.
"LYN!?" he yelled. Getting no response, he took in another deep breath and screamed again, "LYN!"
---
Meanwhile, Reneey was sitting and breathing heavily, but still couldn't feel a thing. "Dean, seriously, I'm fine!"
"Shut up," Dean hissed as they stopped in front of the hospital -- the same one that had taken away Cracklewrist Bob. When they came in, they were greeted by the same doctor from before.
"Mr. Winchester?" he asked, but Dean said hurriedly, "Doc, she's been poisoned!"
The doctor's eyes widened as he brought her into a room behind the ER.
"Reneey, will you be all right by yourself?" Dean asked as he paused in the doorway.
"Yeah, no worries," Reneey answered with a big grin. "BYE!"
And so Dean left for Park Avenue.
---
By this point, Lyn's hope was fading. She was sitting in a corner, shaking from the cold and the horrible things that she kept imagining were happening to Reneey and Sam and Dean. Then suddenly she heard something, someone calling her name. At first, she was sure she imagined it; then it came again, and she recognized the voice.
"Sam?" she whispered, her eyes widening. She tried to call back, but it was so hard to make her voice obey her commands to get louder. Finally, after several tries, she managed a yell.
"SAM!" she cried, hoping against hope that it was him and not just another trick. "SAM, I'M IN HERE!"
"LYN!" Sam yelled, and his voice was less strained now, he was reassured; she was alive. "LYN, WHERE'S 'HERE'? WHICH DOOR?"
"I DON'T KNOW!" Lyn answered, trying her best to keep her voice from cracking. "I WAS UNCONSCIOUS WHEN I WAS BROUGHT HERE! JUST FOLLOW MY VOICE!"
Finally Sam found the right door. He kicked it open and Lyn tried to stand, but then the room started spinning again. She did fall this time, but now Sam was there to catch her and when he did, tears suddenly filled her eyes.
"Shh, it's okay," he whispered, probably thinking that she was shaking from crying and not realizing how very cold she still felt.
Then Dean came in not a second later.
"Reneey's in the ER," he announced upon seeing Sam and Lyn. "She'll be fine."
Lyn closed her eyes and exhaled sharply in acknowledgement of this news, but she couldn't seem to find her voice and, even if she had, it was likely that it wouldn't have been audible anyway.
"Come on," Dean was saying. "Let's kill this son of a bitch." He grinned, and had just pulled out a gun when suddenly someone else came stomping into the room.
"Dean and Sam Winchester," the demon sneered, and then for a split second his black eyes turned to Lyn and seemed to say, 'They're not your friends, eh?'
"In the flesh," Dean smirked as he aimed the gun at the demon.
The demon just laughed that insane cackle again. "You think that's going to kill me?" he demanded.
"No -- but this will."
Dean fired, and a hollow bullet filled with holy water sped across the room and buried itself in the demon's chest. Too late, the demon realized that they must have come prepared to fight him, and he shrieked as he fell to his knees, flesh already ripping away.
Lyn was clinging to Sam the whole time.
"Bastard," Dean muttered as the body collapsed onto the floor. Then suddenly Sam realized something.
"Lyn, you're burning up," he said, and finally looked at her closely. Her face was red and clammy; her normally red lips were pale; her lower lip had been split open, leaving a trickle of blood running down to her chin; and there was something strangely vacant about her green eyes.
"She hasn't been poisoned, too?" Dean asked worriedly, turning to look at Sam and Lyn.
Lyn shook her head slowly, then wished that she hadn't, because it made everything spin again. She tried to speak and explain, but her throat was so dry and something sticky coated the inside of her mouth so thickly that she couldn't seem to make her voice work. Maybe she had strained it too much when she was calling to Sam. Anyway, she realized after a moment, she wouldn't know what to say even if she could.
"Shit! Quick, Sam, we need to take her to the hospital.. again..." Dean said as Sam picked her up.
"But I don't get it," Sam objected as he and his brother ran to the Impala. "They're not supposed to feel pain."
"I don't know," Dean muttered, "but get the blood off her face before that doctor gets more suspicious..."
---
Back at the hospital, Reneey had slipped into a coma. The venom was spreading faster and faster, and it wasn't the usual type of venom that the doctor had seen before. Finally, he sighed and figured that he should call her "brothers."
"Yeah, hello?" Dean asked as he picked up his cell.
"Good evening, Mr. Winchester," the doctor's voice said gently. "I'm sorry to say this, but Reneey has fallen into a coma. This venom -- it's different from the ones we've faced before."
Dean hung up and growled, "SON OF A BITCH!"
"What is it?" Sam wanted to know.
"It's Reneey!" Dean said as he started the Impala's engine. "She's in a coma, the doctor doesn't know what to do about the venom, he says it's not like anything he's seen before.. How did she get poisoned, anyway?"
Lyn's eyes cleared a bit at that. Her voice didn't want to work, but she had to make it, she had to tell them. Finally she managed a raspy sort of whisper that was barely audible. "It was him," she said faintly, then promptly broke into a coughing fit.
"Lyn, REST!" Sam ordered gently.
The 1967 black Chevy Impala stopped in front of the hospital, and one of the nurses instantly recognized Dean as he came in.
"Didn't we just see you?" she asked with raised eyebrows.
Dean ignored that and said, "Quickly! My -- sister -- has a fever.. a high one..."
The nurse's eyes widened, and she called for a doctor. They had never met this doctor before, but he quickly took Lyn to another room behind the ER.
"Sam, you go with Lyn," Dean said. "I'll go check on Reneey and see if they've learned anything new about that venom."
So Dean went to search out Reneey's room while Sam followed the doctor.
---
"Temperature's 104.4," the nurse said, looking surprised, as she withdrew a thermometer from Lyn's mouth. "I've never seen one that high in anyone her age before."
"Could be a sign of strep," the doctor put in, but he sounded doubtful. "It comes with a high fever.. but normally it doesn't get this high in anyone over seven or eight..."
Then he turned to Sam. "Have you been trying to keep her cool?" he asked. "Made sure she drank plenty of liquid?"
"Umm..." Shit, how was Sam going to answer this!? "Well, we -- me and my brother -- went away for business, and left her and her -- our -- sister with some money. Then when we came back we found her like this."
He swallowed hard and hoped that the doctor would buy it.
---
The room where Reneey lay comatose was empty now; apparently the doctor had stepped out for something. Dean walked in quietly and ran his fingers over her forehead.
"Different kind of venom," he murmured slowly. "But what kind? Demon?" He paused. "Snake demon.. holy water.. but how can we get to the venom if it's INSIDE of you?"
Then the doctor walked in, looking sympathetic. "We're still looking for an antivenom," he said quietly.
"I know what to do," Dean said suddenly.
"You do?" the doctor asked with raised eyebrows.
"Yeah, you have to open her up and --"
"Open her up!?" the doctor asked, sounding affronted.
"Umm.. religious reasons!"