Voila! After leaving that one helluva cliffhanger I present to you the twelfth chapter. I hope you guys are enjoying the pace of the story, since I admit it does kind of take a while to pick up, but I feel it would be unrealistic if everything happened too soon.

I want to give out a huge special thanks to those of you who have left their amazing reviews!

Anyway, I'll stop babbling.

TWELVE: Baby Brother

It was taking fiber of strength in my body to cling onto my humanity. All too well I could distinguish Dean's open cut wound from up below and it was as if someone had spilled lighter fluid down my throat and tossed a match. My wrists were restraining so hard against the shackles that I felt the metal material begin to cut into my skin, but the pain was barely recognizable. I watched the flashlight fall to the ground as if in slow motion, the glass and bulb cracking and rendering the room completely black.

I saw Sam fall back and hit one of the shelves so its bearings toppled to the ground beside him. He used his legs to shift feverishly backward, eyes wide as dinner plates.

"D-Dean!" he spluttered, but he was either too afraid or surprised that his voice cracked and I was sure his brother wouldn't be able to hear him.

"Sam, no! Wait! Let me just explain everything!"

"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus—" Sam began chanting the Latin exorcism, clambering to his feet and staring me down with seething eyes.

"Just stop! I'm not a demon! I'm not possessed!"

My heart began pounding so hard against my chest that I feared it would soon leap out of my throat. A sweat broke out along my hairline and my tongue turned dry.

"Omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio . . ."

Sam frowned slightly when his incantation was proving to have no affect.

"What the hell did you do to Kat!?" he yelled, and I was pretty sure he would have gotten Dean's attention by this point.

Dean proved my thoughts right when he shouted the next moment.

"Sam, what's going on!"

"Sam, please," I begged. "Please. I'm Kat. I'm the girl you saw this morning. I'm the girl you've known since you were born. I'm her, Sam."

Sam's entire face contorted with a mingle of sheer confusion and anger.

"You expect me to believe that!?" he said. From his back pocket he pulled out a small bottle which I recognized as holy water. I stiffened slightly into the wall, my eyes flickering from the bottle to Sam's eyes.

"Sam, I'm not a demon," I said slowly, fighting to form words in my brain. The task itself was a challenge; with the full moon up in the sky, it was meant to rise up a Cor Comedenti's most animalistic instincts and doing something as simple as talking was taking a great deal of my brain power.

Sam's expression didn't faze. He unscrewed the bottle and splattered the water over my face. There was as much effect as the exorcism.

"What are you?" Sam said through clenched teeth. "Shapeshifter?"

"A shapeshifter wouldn't remember your first day of school," I said firmly. "They wouldn't remember how you were so nervous about fitting in that you threw up in the boy's bathroom! I remember, Sam, because I was there beside you in that stall for an hour before you came out!"

I watched as Sam's eyes widen to their frame at my words. He actually took a single step back, the hand that held bottle lowering to his side. He looked terribly conflicted. Dumbfounded.

"Stop," he ordered fiercely, dropping the bottle so it fell tot he ground with a loud clank. He folded his hair back with disarray, eyes narrowing down at me with a look of incredulous confusion. "You're—not—Kat."

"Don't call Dean down here—please," I added. "I'm Kat, Sam. I've been hiding this from you the entire time you've been here. I am the Cor Comedenti. I'm the reason behind the dead cows. This is the reason I left my father. The reason I came all the way out here. Plea—"

"Stop!" he said louder, lowering his head and shaking his head like a mad man.

"Sam!" Dean called more anxiously. I heard the slight shift of furniture as he attempted to get to his feet and felt my heart skip.

"Let me talk to you," I said feverishly, moving forward to get closer to Sam but the chains only allowed me to get within a five feet distance from him. I dangled them in front of him. "Why would I chain myself up if I was a demon trying to hurt you? I can't do anything! So please let me explain!"

Sam stared down at me with a calculating stare as I gazed at him with wide, pleading eyes, even if I knew he could not see me in the darkness.

"How can the Kat I know be a Comedenti if she wasn't when we were younger?" he demanded, but I was relieved to hear that his voice had lowered. "And don't shit me saying she was. I would know."

"No, I wasn't," I said solemnly. "It's—it's a recent condition. I've been like this for a year."

"And how did you get like this?" His voice dripped with skepticism and caution. I was at least a little eased that he was listening to me now and wasn't calling down Dean.

"You'll let me explain?" I asked, my breath hitching slightly. Sam looked like he himself didn't know the answer to that and like the majority of his subconscious still didn't trust me.

But: "Five minutes."

A small breath of relief escaped my lips and I looked up at Sam who towered over me. It was rather disturbing watching his eyes in the dark; since most could not see that clearly in the pure darkness, they could not see how much people's pupils dilate.

"It happened a year ago, in Montana," I started slowly. "My father and I were—we were staying in a cottage of his friend's. I don't know. An old hunter buddy." I strained to remember, closing my eyes and trying to ignore the scent of Dean's blood casting itself to my nose.

Sam watched me intently, eyes still filled with weariness, but I had caught his attention.

"On a full moon, like tonight, I woke up with this pain in my body. Like someone set me on fire. After it went away, I jumped out of my window and into the forest—and . . . I . . ." but the small figments of that terrible night were still missing from my brain. It had been so long ago. I shook my head. "I don't know," I said again, hopelessly. "I just woke up in the forest, sleeping on a deer corpse with its chest ripped open and heart missing. I was so scared that I think my mind blanked out a good half of it."

I paused to let Sam mull over these words. He was still frowning and still every time he looked at me a flicker of fear swept through his eyes, but it was Sam's general nature to listen to people. I feared that if it had been Dean who found me he probably would have stabbed me through the gut by now.

"I remember: shaking from head to foot so hard that I thought I was having a seizure. Sam, I—I didn't know that sort of fear existed." My voice threatened to crack as my mind wavered over the gruesome memory I had fought so hard to forget. There was another beat before I continued. "Somehow I ended up back at home where my father was just getting into his truck. He noticed me gone and was about to come look for me. But he—saw me standing there with blood all down my front.

I thought he was going to shout. I thought he was going to shoot me. Hell, I wasn't sure what he was going to do. But probably my last theory was that he would just stare at me, sigh, take me by the shoulder to lead me inside and got me a change of clothes."

I paused again, allowing myself to give a humorless laugh as I leaned back up against the wall again, lifting my head to look at the ceiling with a dry smile. I was opening up old wounds. The flaming anger I felt for my father was rebuilding up once more and it began to pump angrily though my veins.

"He . . . told me what happened," I said seethingly, lowering my head to stare into the corner of the basement. My breath had quickened slightly and my face flushed with anger. Once more I heard Dean struggle to get to his feet and I was suddenly overcome by the fear of how much blood he was losing, but I had to make Sam trust me, and quickly.

"For my entire life, Sam, he kept this a secret." I looked back up at him. "Your father knew. Jack told him when I was only three."

"But how did this happen?" Sam interrupted. His tone was neither convinced nor soft, but still harsh.

I pulled against my chains slightly out of anxiousness, readjusting my position against the wall.

"My mother," I said silently, looking at the ground. "The woman that no one knew. I was only six months when she died. My father never spoke about her. Never. He didn't even have a photo of her and whenever I asked about her he would refuse to talk to me for hours. She was a Cor Comedenti."

Silence. There were a few more yells from Dean but luckily he seemed too indisposed to clamber to his feet and make it down the basement steps.

"Why now?" Sam's voice wavered again. It sounded as though he had something caught in his throat. "Why would it be happening now?"

"I only know from what my father told me in the ten minutes before I learned that he kept this from me, and then I left him," I said. "I shouldn't have, but I was so angry, and so . . . so scared." I breathed in a deep breath. "I never expected to see you and Dean again, Sam. It'd been six years since I had any word from either of you. I never thought that you'd come straying into Dry Prong while on a demon hunt. Especially at the time when I became what I am."

Sam heaved a heavy breath, turning his back to me and running his fingers through his hair, resting his hand on the poles of one of the nearby shelves. With his head bent and hand wiping his mouth, I looked at him with swollen hope that he would believe me.

"When you were in seventh grade, what did you and Dean do to the PE teacher as a prank?" Sam asked, straightening up and turning to face me. I was taken aback by the sudden question, but answered immediately.

"Stole his clothing from his locker when he was taking a shower and spread them over the football field," I said. "You yelled at us for twenty minutes."

Sam didn't smile.

"How do I know if you're not just—some mind-tricking demon?" Even if the question proved otherwise, his tone was softening slightly—only slightly. But it was enough to give me hope. Even enough for me to reach forward and grab his hands in mine. I was delighted to find that he was close enough for the chains to reach him.

He did not flinch when I touched him, but he did frown slightly at the temperature of my hands. It would have risen slightly than from this morning due to the moon.

I pulled at him slightly so that he crouched to his knees. He looked at me with the straining uncertainty, but I knew obviously something I had said got to him otherwise he would be running in the other direction.

"Because you know me, Sam," I said quietly, holding his hands tightly between mine and staring intently into his eyes. "You should know if it's me or not. Look at me," I added quickly, reaching up and cupping his face with my hands and bringing him closer to me. I felt his small resistance, but did not withdraw. "It's Kat. Your friend . . . your sister. Sam—please."

Maybe it was the vulnerable tone that wavered in my voice that occurred on the last word I spoke—maybe it somehow sparked Sam's memory, or maybe it was just because he had known me for so long, but I watched as his eyes grew wide and comprehension splat right across his face.

"Kat . . ." he said quietly, fading slightly into a question. He shook his head, the understanding softening into something that resembled fear. He backed up suddenly, landing on his backside and staring at me with eyes growing as big as tennis balls. I wished he hadn't moved; I wanted so much for some comforting contact that I almost cried out in protest. "Kat, what—what . . . how?" His voice cracked again.

I just shook my head, clasping a hand to my mouth and clenching my eyes shut. It was sick. Even in this moment that I needed to prove so badly that I wouldn't hurt him, I could still hear his blood pumping freely through his jugular vein, painfully exposed.

I swallowed and dared myself to look at Sam again. His expression hadn't changed in the slightest and wore an expression that was appropriate to suggest he thought he was dreaming, or losing his mind.

Yet he did something that took me off guard completely, one of the things that I least expected him to do. He moved forward, dropping silently to his knees and reaching his gorilla-like arms around my body and pulling me into a tight hug. I was temporarily dumbstruck, blinking in confusion as my chin rested against Sam's shoulder. But my body automatically responded to his touch, and I buried my face in the crook of his neck, reaching my arms as far around him as the chains would permit me. With my eyes tightly shut, I allowed myself to be comforted by my 'little brother's' hold. I had always considered him as such. And right now, Sam was proving that remarkable fact by showing me even a trace of love the minute he discovers what I am.

I realized now what the cause of the gaping hole I felt was. In the end, as cheesy as it sounded, all I needed was . . . love.

Sam was my younger brother and Dean . . . Dean was—well, somehow although there had always been the strong bond between us, I didn't exactly see him as a family member. Not by blood anyway. More of an idol or someone to look up to.

Creak.

I jumped slightly out of Sam's grasp as the noise hit my eardrums. It was unmistakably the loose fifth step on the basement staircase, indicating that Dean had gathered enough strength to venture down the staircase.

Sam heard it too. With a shifty glance at me, he got to his feet and glanced around one of the cluttered shelves.

"Sam, where the hell did you go?" Dean grunted and I suddenly felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. With Dean merely standing about fifteen yards away from me, the aroma of his flowing blood danced in the air and drifted into my nostrils. My entire body flattened into the wall behind me, clutching my hands to my nose and mouth.

I didn't even have the mind power to plead for Sam not to tell Dean that I was here. Closing my eyes shut tightly once more and bending over, I tried to force my thought elsewhere.

You're human, you're human, you're human.

But in my entire time in becoming a Cor Comedenti, I had never never once been in close contact to a human that was wounded so severely, especially on a full moon. Animal blood was enough to sate my thirst temporarily, but the Cor Comedenti was meant to live off of humans. It was hard enough for me to be around anyone when the full moon wasn't up.

"Sam?" Dean said again, almost shouting.

"Here," said Sam weakly, and I felt his gaze remain upon me. I waited with my heart hammering, anticipation crackling across my nerves.

Dean let out a sigh mingled with frustration and relief.

"What the fuck, man?" he demanded as he tried to manage his way around all the clutter in the dark. "I was calling for you. I thought you'd in the belly of some slimy demon by this point."

Sam didn't answer, but also remained immobile. I bit down on my wrist, enough so that I tasted the bitter tang of my own blood. It was occupying me from smelling Dean.

"I don't mean to be a downer or anything, but I'm kind of bleeding out my insides here," said Dean with a faint trace of a laugh. He let out a small 'ow!' as he accidentally bumped into a firm object and there was the sound of several objects falling to the ground. "What took you so damn long? What made that noise?"

I raised my head to look at him. He was glancing in my direction. Looking up, he swallowed and ran a hand through his hair.

"Raccoon," said Sam at last, walking forward and impressively putting on a convincing nonchalant demeanor. I stared after him, wide-eyed.

Sam was entering dangerous territory; he was lying to Dean, his brother, to whom there had always been an unspoken oath to always be truthful to. That may have gone without saying considering they were family, but with the Winchesters there had always been a difference. Growing up in an isolating hunter life with no one but your family to turn to, truth was mandatory because everyone was forced to place their full trust in each other.

And Sam was lying to his brother for me.

"Must have gotten in through the basement door. We'll tell Kat about it."

There was a slight pause.

"Yeah, well I'm not too keen on sitting on my ass here like a ninny when we have no idea where she is," Dean said hoarsely. "I say we go look for her."

My stomach tightened with an unfamiliar sensation at Dean's words.

"Dean, you're not going anywhere with a wound like that. She's fine—I mean, I'm sure she's fine. She's . . ." he faded off quietly. A hint of absolute dubiety still hadn't left his voice and Dean seemed to notice it.

"Hey, man, are you okay?" he asked.

"Fine," answered Sam shortly. "Let's focus on finding some bandages."

Dean paused, but somehow Sam had managed to reach his brother and walk swiftly past him and up the stairs. Dean was hesitant in following, choosing to trail his eyes in the place his brother had walked from. His gaze landed in my general area, but I knew it was far too dark for him to be able to see anything. Yet the way his brows furrowed slightly with a trace of almost suspicion lingering in his eyes, it made me feel like the smallest part of him knew Sam was lying.

I remained still, plain out refusing to breath at this point. Dean lingered there staring off into the dense darkness until Sam hurriedly called him back up the stairs. With a final calculating gaze, Dean turned to limp up the stairs and finally shut the broken door behind him.


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