Chapter 11

"Peace of Mind"

Dean woke the next morning to someone screaming. It took him a few minutes to clear out the cobwebs and realize what was going on. Stephanie was screaming, thrashing against him and pushing him away from her. "Stop it!" She screamed, "Don't hurt me! Stop!"

Dean was frantic, he hated when she had these nightmares and they seemed to happen a lot. He tried to wake her but she wouldn't budge from her nightmare. "Chuck!" She screamed out really loudly, frantic. Her heart was pounding and sweat was beading on her forehead. Dean was beside himself, desperately trying to wake her.

"Stephanie! Steph, wake up! Please, wake up!" He shook her violently, repeatedly for what seemed like ten minutes, before he could get her to wake up.

She woke up with a pain in her throat, as if she had been screaming for hours. Her hand immediately went to her throat, confused as to what in the world was going on.

Dean sighed with relief, "I didn't think I was going to be able to wake you."

She turned to him, "What's going on?" Her voice was hoarse and her throat hurt to speak. "Why does my throat feel like I've been at a rock concert?"

"You were having a terrible nightmare." He rubbed her back, "Do you remember anything about it?"

She wrinkled up her forehead, thinking, "Maybe a little. I remember being terrified about something."

He nodded, "That was evident by the screaming. You were begging for someone to stop hurting you. And, you called out the name Chuck; does that mean anything to you?"

"Chuck." She said to herself, thinking, "No, I don't remember anyone with that name." She sat there, thinking hard, "I want to say that someone was raping me."

He pulled her into his arms and ran his hands over her hair, "Baby, I'm so sorry. I know it was traumatizing, but it was just a dream."

She shook her head, "That's just it, though, I don't think it was. Things are coming back to me now."

His back straightened out and he felt anger surging through his veins, "What are you trying to say?"

"I think it was a memory, Dean. I think I was raped."

He tried his best to remain calm, "So, it was most likely this Chuck asshole who did it."

"Must be, if I called out his name, but, I can't make out the face."

"I can promise you this, if or when we find this douche bag, I'm gonna feed him his nuts for breakfast!"

She grimaced, that didn't sound very pleasant. Knowing Dean he would do just what he said he would do too. She almost felt a bit sorry for the bastard.

"Dean, relax, I'm okay. Really, I am."

He threw the covers off him and jumped out of bed. He started pacing the room, yelling. "Why does shit keep happening and I can't do anything about it?"

She went to him, going into his arms, "Sweetheart, stop beating yourself up, okay? I know you feel like it's your sacred duty to protect everyone, but you put too much pressure on yourself. You're only human, Dean, you're not a superhero. I mean, you're about as close as humanly possible, but you're still not superhuman. You can't carry the weight of the world on your shoulders forever; it will wear you down eventually."

"I have to do everything I can."

"And, you will. You were clearly meant for this life, it's in your blood. You will stop as many evil bastards as you are physically capable of stopping and you won't ever stop trying. I know you; you don't give up, no matter what."

He rested his forehead against her shoulder, "I can't tell you how nice it is to have someone to make it all a little bit better."

"I will always do that for you, Dean." She rubbed his back, affectionately.

He placed his lips against hers in a sweet and romantic kiss. "I just hate how everything around me seems to be spinning out of control."

"I can't promise you that everything will get better, because it probably won't, but I can promise you that you will find Sam. I know you will. You and Sam must have like some homing device in you that goes off when you're apart."

Well, that was somewhat true. Dean never felt complete without his brother and Sam, well, Sam always seemed to be just great on his own, but he was better when he was with his big brother.

Dean turned his attention back to Stephanie and the very recent memory. "So, do you remember anything else?"

She thought for a second, "Well, I was in a bedroom, I believe. I was pinned down to a bed and he was on top of me. I think the walls were pink and had some pictures or posters on them."

He nodded, "Pink huh? Clearly you weren't living with a man."

She smiled, "Don't be talking smack about pink; it's my favorite color."

He raised his eyebrow, "Oh is it?"

She shrugged, "Must be."

"Okay, so you were raped in a pink room, which sounds much like a room in a house you might have grown up in, and there was some guy named Chuck involved."

She nodded, "It seems that way, yes."

"And you seem to know a lot about The Bible. So, you must be at least somewhat religious."

She nodded, "I do feel like there's a strong spiritual nature inside of me."

"Alright, well obviously you are getting some aspects of your life back, so it's probably just a matter of time." He was happy for her that she was getting some memories back (even if they were horridly painful ones) but he was nervous for his own fate. What would that mean for their relationship when she got the rest of her memories back?

"Maybe the rape had something to do with the pregnancy." She said.

"And maybe it had something to do with why you are blocking out your memories."

She shrugged, "Or the rape could have been years ago and the fact that I was a demon's puppet might have something to do with why I can't remember anything."

He nodded; there were just so many questions. It seemed as though the more they learned about her, the more questions they found, and that was not helpful.

The rest of the day they spent hunting. Dean had called Bobby again and determined that there was a coven of vampires located in the small town of Claremont, Virginia. They pulled up in front of the police station and hopped out of the car.

Dean made a face, "Well, if this isn't the smallest piece of crap town you've ever seen in your life."

Stephanie smiled, "I think it's kind of sweet. I like the small town environment."

"This isn't a small town, baby, it's a shoebox."

She laughed and they walked into the police station. Dean flashed his badge as soon as he was inside and he was ushered into a private office. Dean read the name plate and then locked eyes with the officer, "Sheriff …Beaker? Have you seen Bunsen lately?"

The sheriff glared at Dean, a blank look on his face, "What?"

Stephanie shook her head, "Never mind."

The sheriff looked confused and a little indignant, almost as if he had just been insulted but didn't quite know how and said, "You must be one of the agents I was informed about." He looked over at Stephanie, "Is this your partner?"

Dean shook his head, "My usual partner was called to another investigation. She is actually an F.B.I. psychologist. She was the best I could get on short notice."

Stephanie made a face at him, "Thanks a lot." She turned her attention to the Sheriff, "I'm Stephanie, it's nice to meet you."

He smiled at her, "Well, it's nice to meet you too." He looked her up and down and winked at her, clearly pleased with what he saw.

She smiled brightly back at him and Dean frowned. "So, I'm here about the recent murders, can you tell me anything about that?"

The Sheriff shrugged, "Just what I put in my report."

Dean smiled again, "Right. Very bloody deaths, huh?"

The Sheriff nodded again, "Yeah if you're being sarcastic, I guess. There wasn't even a speck of blood in these corpses and none of them had been dead more than a day."

"Right." Dean nodded, "I was just testing you, Sheriff."

The sheriff shot him a nasty look, "Sure, sure."

"Do you think I could have a look-see at the bodies?"

The sheriff shrugged, "Whatever floats your boat."

Dean smiled back at him.

Stephanie grimaced; she did not want to look at any dead bodies, that was for darn sure. She wanted to stay right where she was, but Dean grabbed her arm and dragged her into the coroner's office located in the back of the police station. The sheriff turned to them, "We don't normally have this many dead bodies, it was hard to find a place to keep them all. Small towns are usually peaceful."

Dean scoped out the bodies; there were 6 of them, each one a slight bit more decomposed than the other. "When did the killings start?"

The sheriff shrugged, "About six days ago. There seems to be one murder a day, kind of like some ritualistic crap."

Dean nodded and Stephanie tried as best as she could to avoid having to look at any of the corpses. Stephanie did not like dead bodies, but Dean, on the other hand, seemed to be just fine with them.

"Alright, well, that should be it for now, sheriff." Dean said, shaking the officer's hand. "Please call me if anything else happens."

The sheriff nodded at Dean and they left. When they got outside Dean shook his head, "I fucking hate vampires!"

"Are you sure that's what did it?"

He nodded, "Positive."

She shivered; it was just one horrible thing after another. Part of her yearned for a life she knew she must have had, where vampires, werewolves and demons were just stuff of horror movies and had no bearing on real life. She looked at Dean and wondered how anyone could spend their entire life knowing about the existence of these horrible monsters? How much it must have sucked to be Dean as a kid, never having his innocence. It broke her heart when she thought about it and she found herself holding him closer, desperate to take all those years of pain away from him. It was almost as if he could read her thoughts; because he bent his head down to kiss her forehead sweetly.

Just as quickly as their sweet moment had come on, it was gone. Dean was all business again in a matter of two seconds. "We need to find the nest."

"I definitely do not like the sound of this."

He shrugged, "Yeah, I don't particularly care for it either, but unfortunately it is the only way to stop the killings. They will be sleeping now, so they are the most vulnerable during the daylight hours."

She frowned, "I didn't think they slept."

He shook his head, "You're getting your vampire stories confused with reality. Twilight vampires don't sleep…real ones do. And they don't sleep in coffins either, like the old school horror movies would like to make us think. Oh, and garlic does nothing to them and the sun feels like a bad sunburn. They don't actually burn up in the sun." Dean sighed, "And they certainly don't sparkle!"

Stephanie burst out laughing, "I was fairly confident that was pretty bogus."

He smiled at her, "Well, I bet there are a lot of stupid teenage girls out there who aren't. They're gonna get themselves killed thinking that the real things are as frilly as the storybook version."

She laughed; glad that they could talk about something other than the intense situation at hand. She said, "Oh, if you didn't want me to read all this vampire fiction, then why did you let me buy the book in the first place?"

He shrugged, "I don't know, Sam recommended it and he's a girl so I figured you'd like it."

She laughed, "So, how do you know what's in the story anyway?"

He stammered, "Uh, uh…."

"A big burly man like you hasn't been reading my book, have you?"

The guilty look on his face gave him away and he shrugged, "Well, you left it in the bathroom and I forgot my issue of Busty Asian Beauties on the nightstand." He turned to look at her, wanting to change the subject, "I don't really like the idea of bringing you into a vampire nest, but I don't really want to leave you alone to be dinner either."

She cringed, "How do we find the nest anyway?"

He smiled, "We do some research."