Supernatural isn't mine
OK, OK, I know! I'm sorry you guys, I really am. I had a plot point that really needed sitting down and thinking about, and I just haven't had time until recently. I'm hoping the next chapter will be out in more like a week, though. Pray for me!
Many thanks to Lisette, fanficmistress18, StarlitEyes17, SciFiNutTX, Harrigan, pizzapixie, Maygin, Liz Bach, carocali, Nana56, samantha-dean, MistyEyes, Ghostwriter, Shinigami061, Annonie, SeerBlack, JazzyIrish, MystikSnake, Shadewolf7, wcfan, CPAnthoni, xe, Tenshi Aine, meilinglovesshaoran, Pyrebi and blackcatswhiskers for the kind words on chapter thirteen.
As some of you know, this is the last story I'm archiving on this site. My other fanfic can be found at my livejournal by clicking the "homepage" link in my profile. No LJ account is required to read over there.
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The Crow on the Cradle, Chapter Fourteen
In the end, it's Sam who has the idea that gets them through the door.
The police, the family – they think it's a suicide, that the man – Jim Miller – killed himself. It's what it looks like, God, the garage door was locked from the inside, there's no signs of foul play, nothing weird about it at all. Except there is something weird, there's Sam still out of it the next morning, sleeping fitfully and still having trouble speaking clearly. There's Sam, Sam and Sam's visions, and a year ago she would have looked and said suicide too, but she knows so much more now.
The problem is, though, that there's no evidence, nothing that can give them an in as reporters or FBI agents or any of the usual tricks they employ (and she doesn't even know whether to include herself in that they, she doesn't want to, but she thinks maybe she has to). The family's grieving, and even John seems to acknowledge that they can't just barge in there and start asking questions. They're talking about it, arguing, trying to keep their voices low because Sam's still sleeping, when he turns over suddenly and frowns, eyes still closed.
"Jesus, Dean," he says, "we can't go as priests. That's gotta be blasphemy or something."
Dean's sitting on the edge of Sam's bed, and he looks over, frowns. "Sammy?" he asks, but Sam's asleep, Sam can't hear him (Sam's listening to someone else).
"Priests," says John, and they have their way in.
----
She can't be a priest, so she settles for counsellor, finds a long floral-print skirt at goodwill while Dean's getting a dog-collar from wherever it is he gets these things, and a white shirt to go with it. In the mirror, she looks respectable, but she knows it's a lie, knows it because she was respectable once, and this is not what that feels like.
The mother lets them in without question, and she feels it again, the pang of guilt, here's a woman whose husband has just died and really, is she any better than ambulance-chasing lawyers or lying journalists? She's trying to help them, she keeps reminding herself, but really, she's not. She's not in this for them, the people they save, she's in it for Sam, and she wonders what that makes her in the grand scheme of things.
Dean's not a convincing priest, but John's not the sort of person people tend to let over their doorsteps; she's the one who does the smiling, the sincerity, and it's not the first time, not even the second, that she wonders when this part, the convincing, the lying, became her job (and whether it was Sam's job first). She's long since learned, though, that it's best not to think about it, and really, with Sam's visions they don't have to do this too often, usually he's specific, stops the problem before it starts. He was too late this time, though. They were all too late.
She does her duty, talks to the mother, the boy; he looks young, late teens at most, but she discovers he's their age, hers and Sam's, twenty-three years old and still stuck at home, waiting for his chance at freedom. His face is pinched and tired, and it doesn't look new, doesn't look like it's just the result of his father's unexpected death. She wonders if this is what Sam would be like, if he hadn't got away; then she remembers what Sam is like, and she doesn't know who's the lucky one any more.
There's nothing, though. A grieving family, a house full of well-wishers oppressing even her and Dean, total strangers, with their suffocating concern, plates of food and the weightlessness that exists before realisation and despair set in. No EMF readings, no ghosts, nothing that says foul play, and if it wasn't for the memory of Sam vomiting on the motel carpet, blood streaming out of his nose, she would think there was nothing more to see.
As it is, she knows they're missing something.
----
"Nothing," says Dean, shaking his head. It's evening, and they've been searching through newspaper archives since they left the Millers', but there's no evidence that the house has ever been haunted, ever been anything other than a family home. John's cleaning the arsenal, guns spread out across the bed, and that's not strange to her either. For a moment, she remembers how she felt when Dean found the gun in their apartment and threw it on the bed, on their bed; now, she sleeps with one under the pillow (just in case). Respectable.
"Too late," says Sam. He's standing by the wall, staring at an article taped to it, worrying at the hem of his shirt with his right hand. "I don't... I don't understand it. It's supposed, we're, why were we too late?" He glances over his shoulder at Dean, like he's waiting for some kind of explanation, but Dean can only shrug.
"Maybe your visions are out of whack," he says. "That was some pretty bad shit, Sammy. Maybe that's got something to do with it."
Sam shakes his head, then sways and puts a hand on the wall. Dean grabs him by the shoulders and pushes him down to sit on the edge of the bed.
"Maybe it's not the house," she says; she's watching Sam and Dean, like always, but she's thinking too, because this case gives her the creeps, even more than usual, and she wants it done. "Maybe it's connected to the family?"
John's lips twitch slightly as he peers through the barrel of a .45; he's thinking too, but then, he always is.
"I guess." Dean takes a step towards her, reaches for a sheaf of papers on the table. "The name didn't raise any flags in the police database, but--"
And Sam makes that noise again, that noise that makes her want to scream, and drops to his hands and knees on the floor.
----
It's another bad one, as bad as the last one, if not worse, and Sam's barely conscious when it's done (she feels like maybe she's barely conscious herself, worry thrumming high and loud in her brain, pushing against the edges of her skull), but he grabs her (grabs her, and maybe it's just because she's closer, but maybe, maybe) and hisses an address, barely comprehensible. John's up and barking orders before the words have even finished leaving Sam's mouth, and a moment later, John and Dean gone, and she's crouching on the carpet, the fingers of Sam's good hand still tangled in her blouse, his breathing loud and harsh in the silence.
"God," he whispers. "Too, too late. Too late again."
The words are stretched, twisted, they sound wrong, like Sam can't quite remember how to make his lips and tongue work in tandem. She looks down at his face, and there's blood and sweat and tangled hair, but it's more than that, Sam looks different, not the Sam she knew, a lifetime ago and half a country away. She wonders if he's changed, or if this was always what he was like, underneath, the Sam that he would never show her.
"Baby," she whispers, putting her hand on his cheek. All she wants to do is make it better, make this better. She doesn't want this for them, doesn't want it for him, ghosts and demons and visions and nosebleeds, cheap motel sheets and cockroaches and never going home; this is not the life they were supposed to have.
"Can't," Sam says, his head lolling back, and she puts her hand under it, feels the greasy hair against her palm and the warmth of Sam's skin underneath. "Can't go back," says Sam. "Never could, never could have that, Jess, tried, I tried."
"Sh," she says, trying to make sense of what he's saying, and that's strange, too, because there was a time after they got Sam back when she stopped trying, stopped believing there was any sense behind Sam's words, and she wonders when that changed. "It's OK, baby."
"No, no," says Sam, letting go of her blouse and winding his fingers in her hair. "You could, you could. I didn't want to take it from you, Jess. You don't need to, this doesn't have to be your, your life."
She remembers suddenly what Sam said right before he had the first devastating vision the night before, like he was reading her mind, and her belly twists, because why not, Sam can see the future, for God's sake, why wouldn't he be able to--
Can you hear what I'm thinking? she thinks, as loud as she can. Sam just stares up at her, pupils huge and black, blood drying under his nose. "I love you," he says.
She gets a pillow from the bed to prop his head up and goes to fetch water and a cloth. The knot in her stomach is still there, but there's warmth filling it, too.
----
She wakes with a start to find it's morning, and for a moment, she thinks maybe, maybe the whole thing was a dream, because Sam's sleeping next to her in the bed and the light is streaming in through the curtains and it could have been, couldn't it have been? Then she registers the narrowness of the bed, the smell of bleach from the pillowcase, and Dean Winchester sitting in an armchair, watching her, and she realises that if anything was a dream, it was the life she had back then.
She sits up and stretches, careful not to jog Sam. His eyelids look pale, almost blue, like he could see through them if he really tried, and the fingers of his right hand twitch like he's dreaming about playing the piano (though she thinks probably he's dreaming about something much worse than that).
"When did you get back?" she asks Dean, keeping her voice low. She's still wearing her counsellor outfit, the white blouse crumpled and bloodstained now (not so respectable any more); she must have fallen asleep when she crawled onto the bed to make sure Sam was OK (to be close to Sam).
"Couple hours after we left," murmurs Dean. "Didn't want to wake you."
She wants to thank him, but it feels strange; she wonders how long he was watching them, wonders if he felt excluded the way she always does when she sees the two of them together. "What happened?" she asks.
Dean's eyes flick to Sam, then back to her. "Miller's brother got killed," he says, practically whispering. "Can't have been suicide."
"You couldn't do anything?" she knows what Dean's going to say before he says it, but she has to ask.
"We were too late," says Dean, and she doesn't need to say what she's thinking, because she knows he's thinking it too.
----
Dad looked old.
Dean didn't know when it had happened, whether it was in the last year or before that, creeping up on them all. He didn't remember a time when Dad hadn't looked tired (except sometimes, when he remembered bright hair and a warm laugh and a gentle voice singing him to sleep), but this was more than tired, this was old, and maybe it was Sam having visions that were doing God knew what to his brain, maybe it was Sam being crazy, maybe it was Sam going missing, God, maybe it was even Sam going to Stanford and somehow Dean just hadn't noticed it until now; but whatever it was, Dad looked old, and Dean was pretty sure that if he looked in the mirror, he'd look old, too.
"Too late again," said Sam. He was curled in the bed, where Dean had shoved him last time he tried to move, and God, he looked old too, twenty-three years and old already.
"Not your fault, Sammy," said Dean, paging through papers from the next town over looking for any information on the Millers. Dad and Jessica had left half an hour before to quiz the family again, and he knew really, it should have been him, he was the one who'd been there the previous day, after all, he was supposed to be the goddamn priest, but Jesus, after last night, after watching Sam convulsing on the floor and having to leave, having to show up too late to Roger Miller's while Sam was still-- No. He couldn't just leave again, not this time.
"I don't, I don't get it," said Sam, and Dean looked up from the papers (nothing in them anyway, no sign of anything weird) to see him rubbing a hand across his eyes. "It was always, I mean, Dean, you said we could, I could help, I'm supposed to be able to help. Why am I too late?" He struggled into a sitting position and stared, and Dean felt weird, like he was being accused of something.
"Hey, like I know about your freaky visions," he said. "Maybe your brain's cooked from thinking too much." And that wasn't really funny, because maybe it was.
"No," Sam said, and he was getting out of the bed now, starting to pace, shit, getting agitated, two fucking killer visions in two days and now he was getting worked up about things that none of them could change. "You told me, you said, you said."
Dean felt his guts turn over. This wasn't random (crazy) Sam accusations; this was about him, the thing that had pretended to be Dean, pretended to be fucking Dean and fucked Sam up, and Dean just couldn't, he couldn't goddamn stand it. "Dammit, Sam," he said, jumping up and getting in Sam's way, grabbing his wrists. "Just shut up, OK? Shut up."
Sam blinked at him, then his face set, mutinous. "You're so," he said, and then, "Dean, I just, why can't you just tell me?"
"Because it wasn't fucking me!" Dean said. "Don't you get that? God, Sam, why can't you just believe me?"
Sam's face twisted like he was about to yell something back, and then his eyes widened. "Shit, Dean," he whispered, and that was all the warning Dean got before Sam crumpled, and suddenly Dean's grip on his wrists was the only thing holding Sam up, and shit, shit, it was another vision, Dean didn't know how much more of this he could take, both of them on the floor and Sam keening, jerking, Dean didn't have a clue what he was doing, he just wanted, he just wanted all of this to end.
When it was over, Dean realised his jaw was aching from being clenched too tight, and Sam was stumbling to his feet already (Jesus fucking Christ), swiping at the blood under his nose and mumbling. Dean was up and grabbing him by the shoulder before he got halfway across the room, "Fuck, Sam, no, you're hurt, you've got to--"
"Got to go," Sam said, eyes wide and pulling at Dean's grip. "Can't be too late again, Dean, Dean, God, he's going to kill her."
"I'll call Dad," said Dean. "Dad'll take care of it, Sammy, tell me what you saw." He was groping for his cell phone with the hand that wasn't holding Sam, but Sam pulling hard, shit, Sam jerked and suddenly Dean's fingers were closing on empty air and the door banged and Sam was gone. "Fuck," muttered Dean, and started to run.
Sam was picking the lock of the Impala when Dean got outside, but he was doing a piss-poor job of it, hands shaking too hard to manage. "For fuck's sake," Dean said. "Sam, we are not doing this."
Sam straightened up, leaning against the roof of the car. A blood vessel had burst in one of his eyes, and it made him look alien, wild. Dean wondered if he looked the same.
"Why did you give me this?" Sam asked.
"What?" Dean scrambled to catch up, always behind these days, Sam's thoughts were so freakin weird and he always seemed to think that Dean would just get it (failing your brother again, Dean).
"This," said Sam, gesturing at his head with his fucked-up hand (failing your brother), eyes rolling, black and red and almost inhuman. "Why did, why did you give it to me if you're not going to let me help?"
Dean opened his mouth, ready to start another round, not me not me I didn't do it Sam can't you even tell that it wasn't me, except that someone was going to die and for all Dean wanted, needed to make Sam realise, if they were too late again things were only going to get worse (and Dean was tired, he was too fucking tired to have that conversation again). He snapped his mouth shut and pulled the car keys out of his pocket. "Let's go," he said.
----
Dad and Jessica were all the way across town interviewing some old neighbour of the Millers or some shit like that, and Dean and Sam were the advance guard. It felt weird, having Sam there but not Dad, like there was something missing, but there wasn't time to think about that, because Sam was opening the car door before he'd even finished pulling over and staggering towards the house. "Shit," muttered Dean, grabbing his gun and following.
Sam hadn't said much coherent on the way over, but Dean was pretty sure that somehow these murders had something to do with the Miller kid, Max, which made no freakin sense because no way in hell was that scrawny little guy a supernatural being, but hey, it wasn't like anything else made any sense these days either, so it was just one more thing to add to the list. He caught up just as Sam burst through the door, and shoved himself in front, hand on the gun tucked in his waistband, ready for whatever the fuck was going on.
What was going on, as it turned out, was Mrs. Miller chopping vegetables.
"Father Simmons," she said, looking up in surprise, and the kid was there, too, Max.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"Uh," said Dean, because he was way out of his depth here, had no clue what was going on, and Sam was just standing there, staring. "Sorry to interrupt."
"Who--" started Mrs. Miller, but Sam suddenly started talking.
"Max," he said, and the kid's gaze snapped to him, making the hair on the back of Dean's neck stand on end. "Could we, uh—could we talk to you outside for just one second?"
"Who are you?" Max asked, frowning, and OK, maybe Dean could believe that this little snot was behind all this shit, because he looked pretty much like he was ready to murder someone right now.
"This is my associate, Father Frehly," said Dean, thinking fast (and shit, like they were just going to believe him, because Sam's face was smeared with sweat and blood, and he looked about as much like a priest as, well, as Dean).
The thing was, though, they did. It was like the word father opened this magic door, and for just a moment, Dean thought maybe they were going to get away with this, whatever the hell this was. Right up until the door handle suddenly jerked out of his hand and all the windows in the house slammed shut simultaneously and Dean's gun was pulled out of his hand by an invisible force (an invisible fucking force) before he could even taken aim properly. That's when Dean knew that they were in deep, deep shit.
The freakish thing about it was, Sam, Sam who got freaked by every fucking thing and would start yelling about nothing and talked to the air half the time, Sam was just standing there talking calmly to Max like he was Sam, for all the world like whatever was broken in his mind had fixed itself, just like that. Dean heard something about visions and death, and then he focussed suddenly, because Sam was talking about sending him away, Sam was talking about being alone with this little fucking freak bastard.
"Nuh uh," he said, "no way."
Overhead, the light fitting started to sway. This was so fucked up, and Dean had no idea what was going on, but he knew that it was big, it was something big.
"Nobody leaves this house!" yelled Max, and Dean resisted the urge to jump forward and beat the shit out of the kid only because he had a gun (Dean's fucking gun, goddamn dumbshit) levelled at Sam.
"And nobody has to, all right?" Sam said, calmly and quietly, and Dean knew that tone because it was the one he used on Sam. "They'll just—they'll just go upstairs."
Like fucking hell. "Sam, I'm not leaving' you alone with him." Where the fuck was Dad?
"Yes, you are." said Sam. "Look, Max, you're in charge here, all right? We all know that. No one's going to do anything that you don't want to, but I'm talking five minutes here, man."
"Sam," said Dean, but Sam put his hand up, and Max was nodding slowly, looking at Sam like somehow he was a friend.
"Five minutes," he said, and Dean hesitated, but Sam shot him a look and jerked his head at the kitchen. The woman, Mrs. Miller, was lying on the floor and Dean realised he had no fucking idea how she'd got there, but her head was bleeding, and Dean knew what Sam was saying. Save her. You have to save her.
It was what Dean did, what they did, Winchesters, always there to save people. And so it was what Dean did now, even as he felt his skin tightening in fear.
-----
"Here," said Dean, putting the cloth to Mrs. Miller's forehead. Her cut wasn't bad, normally probably not even something he would look at, but he had to do something while Sam was downstairs with Max (alone with Max), something to stop himself just storming back down those stairs and breaking the goddamn kid's neck. Five minutes, that was what Sam had said, and Dean was counting the seconds, because if it went any longer, he was going to beat the shit out of someone (and right now, he didn't much care who).
The bedroom door swung open, and Dean turned (it's Sam, it's gotta be Sam) to find Max in the doorway. Rage surged up in his gut (where the fuck is Sam, what did you do to him you bastard), and he started to walk forward, but something picked him up and flung him backwards, smashing him against the wall hard enough to wind him, and shit, Max was pulling out the gun (the gun Dean brought), leaving it hanging in the air like it was on a string or something, pointed at Mrs. Miller.
"No," she said, "Max", and Dean started forward, gotta get between the civilian and the gun.
"Stay back," said Max, calm, like there was nothing left to be scared of now. "It's not about you." Which was really not that comforting, given that the gun was pointed at him now.
"If you want to kill her, you gotta got through me first," said Dean, because that was always the kind of thing they said in the movies, and, well, it made his point pretty well (and where the fuck is my brother, bitch?).
"OK," said Max, and Dean was just thinking that maybe he'd seriously miscalculated when the door burst open again and Sam stumbled through, bleeding again, hair matted and eyes wild, and Dean just had time to think he looks like he's had another vision when Sam started talking, yelling and pleading, trying to convince Max that his life was worth something, and all Dean could think was he sounds like he knows what he's talking about. He sounds sane. And it wasn't the first time he'd had the creeping thought that Jessica was right, that Sam was a nu--, was mentally ill, but the contrast was so fucking stark, even babbling here Sam sounded so different, so in control, and Dean was still tangled up in wondering about it when the gun went off and Max slumped to the ground.
Sam's face went suddenly slack, like whatever had been holding him together had just snapped. Dean didn't even spare a glance for the body on the floor (sick fucking freak), was at Sam's side, checking him over, you're OK, right, he didn't do anything to you?
Sam looked up at Dean with dull eyes. "It's the same," he said. "It was the same, Dean. It's never been the same before."
Dean thought about asking what Sam meant, but he didn't have the strength.
----
It's been a long day, a long week. Max Miller is dead, and she can't feel sorry, even though she knows she should, knows that he had a terrible life, a terrible death. She knows that Sam feels sorry, knows it from the things he whispers, curled up on the bed, face clean now but no way to erase the blood-covered spectre she saw when they finally got the door open from her mind. None of them know everything about what happened in the Miller house, except maybe Sam, and he can't or won't tell them, muttering about being too late and things being the same, eyes glazed and drifting. Dean thinks he had another vision in the house, which makes four in three days, and she's terrified, terrified that this is how they'll be now, wrenching his brain so hard that soon there'll be nothing left, not even the fragments they have now. She can't lose Sam again. She won't.
"I don't give a shit," mutters Dean, and she glances over. He's packing his stuff, and she should be, too, but she doesn't want to leave Sam, doesn't want him out of her sight (because what if he has another vision and dies when she's not there?) John's sitting in the corner of the room, watching, like always, and he's not packing either, and she wonders how similar his reasons are to hers. They're all tired, so goddamn tired, and she thinks Dean doesn't even realise he's spoken aloud.
"What?" she asks. The last thing they need is someone else having conversations with the air.
Dean looks up, face tight. "I don't care if he got beaten on," he says. "He was a killer."
She wonders if Dean can read her thoughts, too, if maybe he's going crazy, like Sam. Wonders if maybe they're all crazy, if they've all been crazy all along.
"Yeah, maybe," says Sam, and they look round. He's looking across the room towards them, seems to be talking to them. Dean opens his mouth, but Sam isn't finished. "Aren't you worried, man? Aren't you worried that I could turn into Max or something?"
Dean frowns, and she feels her own face draw down. "What are you talking about, Sammy?" he asks. "Why would I think that?"
"No," says Sam. "Why?" and she's getting the feeling that actually, he's not talking to them, to Dean, after all, but Dean pushes on.
"You're nothing like Max," he says. "You got that, Sam?"
Sam shifts in the bed, sits up straighter. "Dad? Because Dad's not here, Dean."
She glances at John, and Dean does the same. His face doesn't change, but something flickers in his eyes, and she wonders if that's what hurt looks like on John Winchester's face.
"Dad's right here," Dean says, taking a step forward and gesturing at John. "He's right here, Sam."
"Where?" says Sam, and Dean's face rearranges itself several times, incredulous to angry to disappointed to tired.
"Here, Sammy," says John, unfolding himself from the chair and stepping into the light. "I'm right here." She looks over in surprise, because somehow she's always surprised to hear him speak, the deep tone of his voice seeming like it's coming from the earth itself, and here, here there's a gentleness she's rarely heard from him before. Sam looks up at him, and then at her, and finally at Dean.
"It's not the same any more," he says, dropping his gaze to his lap. "I'm sorry."
"It's OK, Sam." It's what they always say, what Dean always says, but this time it's not Dean, it's John, and he sounds so fucking tired. "It's gonna be OK."
----
They leave Saginaw the same night (Sam's been gone two hundred and fifty-four days), and for a week, Sam doesn't have any visions. When one finally comes, she's almost relieved, because it's just a normal one (a normal vision), just a headache and shaking hands, not blood and vomit, not blown pupils and God knows what going on inside. They call the police in Hibbing, Minnesota about a gang of serial killers there, and wonder why Sam is having visions of non-supernatural things. They move across the country, hunting and researching, trying to figure out what's going on with Sam, with the demon that may have killed Mary Winchester and may have driven her son out of his mind, with their lives.
They still have to live, for all that life isn't what it once was; they have to do laundry and buy groceries and hustle pool (and she's not sure when she started thinking of that as a domestic chore, but she's given up counting the things that have changed in her life). She's convincing as a social worker or local government official, but she sucks at pool and at poker, so she stays behind in Joliet when Dean and John go to get their next week's grocery money. Sam's sleeping fitfully (Sam's been gone two hundred and seventy days), and she sits on the bed next to him, watches infomercials because she's too tired to research any more.
Around nine, Dean comes back.
"You're early," she says.
He shrugs. "Slim pickings. Dad stayed out, see if he can find a card game. Anything good on TV?"
She shakes her head. "Is there ever?"
He stops by the bed, looks down at Sam, face weirdly blank. "Listen, Jessica, you think I could have a little time alone with Sam? There's something I want to talk to him about."
She doesn't want to leave, not really, feels the warmth of Sam against her leg like it's something untainted by all this mess. But Dean is Sam's brother, and she's got used to the idea that he's the most important thing in Sam's world (she doesn't like it, but she's used to it), and she's tired, anyway, ready for bed, so she goes, closes the door on them and goes back to her own room, quiet and empty and somehow still buzzing with John.
She can't sleep, though, lies on her back staring at the ceiling for an hour before deciding to go back. It's summer, and even harsh with gasoline fumes from the neighbouring road, the air feels soft against her skin. She stops at the door to Sam and Dean's room, because there are raised voices – or Sam's voice is raised, anyway, she can't hear Dean. I don't understand why, she hears, and then decides that she doesn't want to intrude on this, whatever it is, and goes for a walk instead, breathing in the night air and pretending she's on vacation. It's not until she's circled the tiny patch of greenery across from the motel three times that she looks up and realises something's wrong, because John's truck is pulling up in the parking lot, and the light's dim, but she's pretty sure she sees John getting out of it, and OK, that's not weird in itself, that's fine, except for--
Except for how she left Dean with Sam, but Dean's getting out of the truck, too.