Hello, remember me? Eight billion apologies for the huge delay in the posting of this but my laptop that I have been nursing along for the last year had to be given the last rites and put to rest leaving my computerless for three weeks! I now have a pretty little notebook that should solve a lot of my problems and get this (and the other stories I have languishing although they are still all on the old laptop and I have to find a way to rescue them *waves to brother in law*)

I have the next 2.5k of this written so hopefully I won't keep you waiting as long next time. Hope you are all enjoying the new season, I know I am. Mary x


Bobby swung the car into the space outside the room number that John had text him with and shook his head as Dean was out the car and halfway to the door before he'd even set the brake. He pushed opened his door to find that Dean was back, hand out and a frustrated look on his face. "I need your lockpicks."

Fumbling in his pocket Bobby retrieved them and handed them over. "Where's yours?"

"Sam," Dean answered like that should mean something to the older man, already turning as the metal 'keys' dropped into his hand, heading back to the door. Bobby chuckled as it was opened quicker than he could have with the actual key and Dean was in. Following the younger man into the room he whistled lowly at the new décor that covered the walls.

"Forgot John likes to work this way," he muttered raising a hand to run it over the jumble of pictures and articles that littered the wall. Dean was mirroring him but unlike the older hunter it looked more like the younger man was reading Braille, getting something from the mass of information that Bobby couldn't see.

"Jefferson Park," Dean mumbled pulling himself away from the wall and turning to look for something on the desk. Finding the map he opened it and began tracing the lines on it with his fingers. Finally he stopped and tapped an area that on looking Bobby could see was just west of the motel. "They're here," Dean offered, circling a small area with his finger. "Somewhere."

"That's about four square miles, could take a while to find them…."

"…..I'll find them, besides, dad wants this thing to track them so he wouldn't be hiding his trail." Dean folded the map and turned towards the door. "Come on we're burning time we don't have here."

"Easy kid," Bobby reached out a hand and stayed Dean's exit. "You need to go into this with your head on straight or I ain't letting you go." Dean raised an eyebrow and Bobby just folded his arms across his chest. "Try me," the hunter continued. "So take a breath, check that gun of yours is packing silver and then we'll head."

Dean sighed but pulled his Colt from his waistband and ejected the clip tipping it to let Bobby see the light reflect off the silver bullets that filled it. When the older man nodded he slid it back home and headed for the door. "You coming or not," he asked when Bobby didn't immediately follow him not halting in his exit as he did.

"Winchesters," Bobby muttered as he swung the room door closed behind him and headed out after Dean to the car.


Sam was muttering a continuous litany of every curse word his brother had ever learnt him as he stumbled after his father. They were making their way through dense woods on a path that only John could have found. Trees and brambles ripped at his face and his jacket, slowing him, and he had to keep moving the heavy duffle from shoulder to shoulder because of the weight. John was marching through the narrow passage and pulling further and further ahead and Sam wanted to shout him back but he had been warned no verbal contact so he did the only thing that he could think of to make his father wait on him.

John stopped dead, a hand rising to his neck as he turned and glowered at his young son. The murderous look deepened as he retraced his steps back to Sam.

Taking an involuntary step back under the psychotic look and his father bearing down on him Sam dropped the duffle and took a defensive stance.

"What," John growled at him, "..the hell was that?"

"I needed you to wait, and you said no verbal, so…," Sam looked down at the other stone he held in his hand. "I can't carry this any further," he continued kicking the dropped duffle.

"Oh for god's sake." John snatched the duffle up and threw it over his shoulder. "Damn moon'll be gone by the time we get there at this rate." He pushed Sam in front of him. "And no verbal means no muttering obscenities to yourself, some of which I'm gonna have to have a word with your brother about, mind him to watch his mouth around you."

"Sure we can't swear but we can kill things, 'cos that makes sense."

John gripped his shoulder and urged him forward. "Just shut up and move."

The path finally widened and then they stepped out in to a wide clearing with trees on two sides and a high sloping ridge of rock on the other. John dumped his own bag, the one he had taken from Sam, and the rolled up tent that he had brought at his feet and turned to his son. "Go get some firewood, do not go any further than the edge of the clearing though okay? Stay where I can see you."

"We're building a fire?"

"This thing's been hunting this part of the forest, I want this job done and finished with, so yes we're building a fire and I'm gonna bring it to us. Do you have a problem with that?"

Sam looked round the clearing and at all the various angles that the werewolf could come at them and wanted to raise the point but his father had that look in his eye that even Sam wasn't fool enough to niggle at. He let his shoulders slump to show his disapproval of John's thinking but kept his mouth shut, after all like the man said, sooner the werewolf finds them sooner Sam could go. "Firewood, stay in the clearing," he muttered back to his father as he turned and headed for where there were a few fallen trees.

John watched him walk away with a shake of his head and then pulled the tent free of its cover and started to erect it. The moon was almost fully overhead and once it was they would be getting company, ready for it or not. John aimed to be ready.

Sam poured some of the lighter fuel on the wood and then stepped back as he lit and dropped the match. The fire whooshed into life, ebbed back and then caught, its light chasing the nearby shadows back towards the trees. The younger Winchester stood watching the flames devour the wood, mind thinking briefly of another fire that had devoured his and his family's lives and then John's bark pulled him back to the present.

"Quit screwing around and get your ass over here," John called from his position near the rocky outcrop and Sam turned with a huff and a sigh and marched across the grass.

"Are we going to have a problem here Sam because I distinctly remember that I told you to light the fire and then get over here, not stand and admire the pretty flames!"

"I was just making sure it caught, sir." He added the last word on by summoning up all the resentment he felt about being here and let it colour its execution but John barely seemed to notice, his mind focused on the hunt.

"This way."

Sam followed his father at a trot feeling just like a dog as he trailed a few steps behind his lord and master. He wanted to ask what the plan was but he knew enough that whatever it was he wasn't going to get to have any input into it. It was always John's way or the highway. Sam knew which one he wished he could choose.

"Sam!"

He cursed as he realised that his father had been talking to him and he had zoned out. "Sorry, can you repeat that?," he asked making sure that he stayed outside of John's arms range as he did.

"Jesus Christ Sam, stay with the damn program here. If you aren't watching for this thing coming then it's gonna tear you apart, literally. I need you to have my back on this Sam. Do you?"

Sam nodded. "Yes sir, sorry sir."

"I said, there is a hollow in the rocks over there, when we hear it coming I want you to head over there and stay there until it's down. Is that clear?"

The hairs on Sam's neck bristled with his anger. "You brought me all the way out here to hide!," he spat at his father.

"No," John answered with a sigh and a shake of his head. "I brought you out here so that if this werewolf gets the jump on me I've got you to take it down. Your my backup Sam so that's what I need, you to have my back. So it's decision time Sam, you in or out here?"

Sam lifted his gun, checked the clip and then dropped his hand to his side. "I'm in."

"Good," John smiled at him. "Now let me show you where this opening is and then we can get something to eat."

They ate in silence, John listening to the sounds around them and Sam trying to concentrate on the here and now and not slip away into his own head space again. His father's voice caused him to lift his head.

"So, does Dean go out a lot on his own when I'm on a hunt?" John stirred the soup he had made and didn't look up at his son, his eyes scanning the woods around them instead.

Sam frowned. Dad wanted to chat on a hunt while waiting for the big bad to show? This couldn't be good. "Thought you said no verbal?," he asked, side stepping the question and taking another bite of his sandwich to try and head off answering.

John dropped the mug and looked over at his youngest son, staring at him until he caved.

"How do you mean?," Sam asked cagily.

That got him another look for avoiding the question again and then John turned his eyes back to the tree line. "When I'm hunting on my own, does Dean go out a lot at night? It's a simple question Sam."

"He doesn't leave me alone for long if that's what you're worried about." No way was Sam getting Dean into trouble and that was where he thought this line of questioning looked like it was heading.

"But he does go out sometimes?," John pushed on.

Sam shrugged. "Sometimes," he started quickly adding, "….only when we're short on cash. He goes to hustle pool or something."

John gave him another look that had the wheels in Sam's head grind into life. "Define 'or something'?"

"Why?"

John glared at him and Sam looked away, staring out across the clearing, pretending to scan for movement. His father looked away again but Sam still felt a little flame of anger light inside him on his brother's behalf. "I don't know where he goes and I don't ask all I know is that there is food on the table in the morning and I have my brother to thank for it. And I don't need to be watched twenty four you know."

John ignored the dig, checked the clip on his gun. "Is he out long?"

Sam watched as his father cut him a quick glance and then went back to scanning their surroundings. Realisation dawned on the younger man that there was a reason behind the questioning, something that had his father so on edge enough that he was ignoring his own rules on one hundred percent attention on the hunt. "What did he do?"

John wiped at his face and shot him a tried for, too casual, smile. "Didn't say he did anything, just making conversation."

"In the middle of a hunt? And it isn't a conversation it's a brain picking session," Sam shot back, senses on alert now for more than just the werewolf. He studied his father, going over his brother's actions again the night he'd ran out on him. The link between that and this chat was there but it was mocking him from a distance.

The silence stretched on as John waited for an answer and Sam tried to think of a way to avoid giving one. Yeah, now that you mention it Dean does go out a lot at night, more than he thinks I know. "He doesn't eat when you're away," was what he said instead, using one truth to divert John's attention from the answer he wanted. He looks down at his boots drawing a lazy circle in the soil with one.

John was sure that he didn't hear that right. "Sorry?," he questioned dumbly, the werewolf all but forgotten for a moment. He could have sworn that Sam said…

"Dean. He doesn't eat when you're not there. He tries to hide it, only eats when he knows I'm watching and he can't get away with scraping it back into the pot or a dish for me the next day. It's only when there's nothing left for either of us that he slips out at night, I used to think is was for a girl but now…..there's always food there the next day." Sam said the words like it only just hit him that his brother seemed to be able to materialise food out of nowhere. "What's he been doing to earn the money?"

John was still trying to process that Dean seems to have lied to him about how often he's been out on the streets and the fact that his eldest son seems to be starving himself when he wasn't there too. A picture of Dean sitting slowly chewing his food in the days John returned home slammed into his mind, the same son who normal inhaled food when it was put in front of him. He's letting his stomach adjust back.

"Dad!"

The urgency in Sam's voice dragged him back out his head and he heard it too then, the soft rustle that wasn't just the wind. "Move!," he growled, lifting his gun in the direction that the werewolf was coming from even as he berated himself for his stupidity for getting distracted.

Sam bolted in the direction of the rocks and John wished he could afford the time to check that he'd got there safely but the thing was pounding across the grass at him and he only had time to aim and fire off a shot as it leapt towards him.

It connected solidly with him, there was a bolt of pain as claws sliced his skin and then something hard collided with his head and his world greyed to the sound of Sam's shout.


Short and with a cliffie, I know I am evil! x