A Supernatural Ghost Story: Chapter 14;
Sam closed the book and set it on the seat beside him but he could still see the words floating on the backs of his eyelids. Over the past week he'd read, and re-read that same chapter on soul stealers so often that he could probably recite it by memory at this point. And still they were no closer to figuring this out, but the clock was slowly ticking down.
"Another three days until the new moon," Dean pointed out, slowing the car as the wheels crunched on the gravel driveway and small stones flew out behind them.
"I know that," Sam said, trying not to sound as angry and frustrated as he felt. The last week had been quiet, no more zombies, no more ghosts acting up…hell, half the time Sam spent wishing that there was a little more supernatural activity going on. He hadn't seen Jane again since that night on the library steps…she'd looked so exhausted, concentrating on holding herself together so hard, he hated to admit it, but he was actually worried about her. What if something had happened and she couldn't come back? The rest of the time he spent berating himself for worrying about the death of a ghost—surely that was a good thing right?
"And then Death's supposed to ride," Dean interrupted his train of thoughts. Dean had been happy at least that their neighbourhood ghost hadn't reappeared again. Not like it stopped him from salting Sammy in bed every night; a thick line surrounding the whole bed and burning oak and hemlock in the bathroom when he thought that Sam wasn't watching.
"Know that too," Sam said, losing the battle with keeping the frustration out of his voice.
Dean pulled the car over and parked. He sat silently for a moment before turning off the engine, then reaching out to straighten Sam's tie from where his brother slumped in the passenger seat. "I just wish that we could do something to stop his damn soul army from getting so big," Dean said, taking one last look at himself in the mirror and deciding that he looked as much like an FBI agent was he was going to, before getting out of the car.
"Ready?" Dean asked, leaning in the open window when Sam didn't move.
'Yeah," Sam sighed, reaching for his own door and wondering when he'd started thinking of mass homicides as just another part of the job. "I'm coming."
"So you said that he just walked in and started shooting?" Dean asked, stepping a little further back from the slightly green deputy who was stationed at the outside of the building, and hoping that the poor guy didn't throw up on his shoes. Clearly he'd been delegated to the other side of the yellow police tape that ringed the entrance because his colleagues shared this same concern for the preservation of their footwear.
"That's what the tape shows," the man said, swallowing convulsively. "Walked in, smiling and stopping to talk to the clerk at the desk, and everything was normal. Suddenly out of no where, he pulls a gun from his briefcase and just started shooting everyone."
"Any survivors?" Sam asked, his fingers tightening on the small black notebook he carried as an FBI agent.
"Not a one," the man stuttered and paled even further. "The whole courthouse full of people, the judge, lawyers, clerks, security…hell even the prisoners…all gunned down…and the blood, I've never seen so much…" he swallowed again, bringing a hand up reflexively to cover his mouth and he staggered as the memory overwhelmed him.
Sam stepped up towards him, a hand closing over his shoulder and his face creased in concern, "Are you alright?"
'"Uhhh, Sammy…" Dean started, trying to warn his brother; sometimes Sam's caring nature got in the way of his common sense.
"Wha--?" Sam started before jumping back quickly as the deputy gagged and then threw up at his feet, some of the vomit splashing off the gravel and onto his neatly pressed black suit pants. They all stood there for a moment, Sam's eyes blinking in surprise and self annoyance that he didn't see the obvious coming, before the deputy got a hold of himself and started apologizing profusely.
"Gosh, oh, I'm so sorry…it's my first homicide, and well, the blood…." He trailed off looking pale again, and Sam squeezed his shoulder once, a tight smile on his face before stepping further away this time.
"Don't worry about it," Sam mouthed emptily.
"Happens all the time," Dean added, trying to smother the laughter in his voice as Sam turned a withering look on his brother before slashing at the yellow tape and stalking into the building.
"Hey! Wait up Sammy!" Dean called out, starting into the building and catching up with Sam in a few steps. The entranceway was lined with brown uniformed officers, but still their numbers couldn't hide the bright splashes of blood that stained the marble floor or wooded crests of justice that were mounted on the walls.
"Don't start Dean," Sam said, still ineffectually wiping at his pant leg with the shoe on the other foot. He seemed unconcerned by all the blood surrounding them. The bodies had been removed by now, but the aftermath of a 12 person murder wasn't something that even Dean was used to seeing every day.
"I know that Defense Attorneys can get a little wacked, too much associating with criminals all day, but this is insane," Dean observed.
"What about the end of the world did you expect to be civilized and sane?" Sam asked, looking dead cold at his brother and giving up on removing the look—or smell—of vomit from his person before walking past where the security desk used to be and over to the officer in charge.
"Nothing, but it didn't have to be this," Dean muttered quietly to himself as he stared at the blood splatter. "This was overkill. This was fun."
Sam threw his jacket onto the chair that sat just inside the door to their hotel, scowling in disgust at the sour smell that came into the room with him and glaring at his pants. The car ride back had been nearly impossible, even with the window rolled down and the only thing that had kept him from stripping or complaining was the sure knowledge that Dean would tease him mercilessly for having the nose and sensibilities of a girl. But then Dean had been strangely quiet on the ride back himself.
His shoes thumped against the wall beside the chair, and Sam started in on his pants as he heard the door close behind him. His fingers fiddled with the metal buckle on his belt, but he looked up when he heard Dean sigh and the bed creak from beside him. His brother lay stretched out on his back, hands rubbing at his eyes and looking the picture of defeat. Sam stopped dead, his fly sagging open but he didn't notice.
"Dean?" he asked hesitantly. "Are you alright?' A few years ago he would have thought it impossible to think of his brother and the word Defeat in the same sentence. Hell for most of his childhood he'd grown up practically worshiping the very ground that his big brother walked on and trying to be just like him, and yet now he couldn't deny how tired and lost Dean looked sometimes.
"No," Dean said, his voice slightly muffled from beneath his hands as they rubbed once more over his face before he sat up and clenched his long fingers into the bedspread. "No I'm not alright. We've seen slaughters before," he looked up meeting Sam's eyes where he stood silently watching. "Damn Sammy, we've even done the slaughtering ourselves when necessary, but in that courtroom today…it was something different, they did that for fun Sam, they enjoyed it…" he trailed off, eyes falling away to settle at Sam's feet. "Hell I don't blame that poor kid—but look at you," he exclaimed, voice returning to normal and he forced a smile as he saw the pained and lost look enter Sam's eyes. He was the big brother here… look out for Sammy; the familiar refrain echoed in his ears and he fought down his fears, trying to be bright and bold for his brother. "Toss me your shoes and that rag while you go clean up," he motioned at where Sam's shoes lay discarded behind him.
"Dean," Sam said and only got as far as his brothers name before he ran out of things to say. What could he say to that? Dean was right, whatever had killed those people in the courtroom had enjoyed it. Had specifically chosen that setting to mock whatever justice might have existed in this town, or in the minds and hearts of two brothers that happened to be in the town at the moment. And Sam had absolutely nothing that he could do to stop it. Oh, he could voice the old platitudes; we'll come up with something, tomorrow will be better, Bobby's probably going to call with the answer any second now…but they all rang hollow. Truth was that they were running out of time until Death personified strolled into town and everyone and everything died horrible and blood to feed its army, and Sam had nothing that he could do, or say to change that.
Dean looked up, his eyes crinkling in sympathy at the effort that Sam was making to try and find something…anything to give him hope, but knew that it was a losing battle from the get go. They were facing the apocalypse and nearly certain death, sooner or later that truth had to catch up to them.
"Toss 'em here," he said softly, then as Sam's foot swung he finally found the necessary motivation to bring a real smile to his lips; "You stink like a barroom floor."
"Bitch," Sam replied, a smile lighting his own face before he stalked into the bathroom.
"Jerk," Dean said, picking up the closest shoe and starting to work the mud and flecks of partially digested food off the patent leather.
Sam slipped his feet out of his pants and turned on the water in the sink, wondering briefly whether hot or cold would be better while he stood in front of the mirror in his boxers, socks and dress shirt. The tie had been torn off and tossed into the backseat of the impala in frustration within the first few minutes of being back in the car. He looked at his reflection trying to see a hint of the boy who found such excitement in this life and so much to admire about his big brother who was so good at hunting what went bump in the night…or any resemblance to the man he was on his way to becoming at Standford, who still fought to protect people and make his brother proud in a different way…but all he could see was the grey hardness in his eyes, and something dark and cold looked back at him, so unfamiliar that he was glad when the steam from the water started to fog and cloud the surface.
"Well if there's one good thing that's happened in the past few days, it's that your ghost girl seems to have disappeared along with all of Death's other goonies" Dean called from the other room.
Sam closed his eyes, feeling his hands automatically clench in the wet and soapy fabric of his pants. His brother still refused to believe that she wasn't working with the horsemen and didn't mean them any harm…and Sam still hadn't found the words to explain what he'd seem happen in the graveyard that night: how she'd saved them.
"Come on Sam," Dean exclaimed, reading his brother's silence through the partially open bathroom door as clearly as if he'd spoken out loud. "She shows up right when we're close to finally lassoing this horseman, demons and zombies and soul stealers roaming this town, disappears right when everything goes quiet again and you still won't believe that somehow that ghost is involved with Death?"
"She's not just 'that ghost' Dean," Sam said quietly, eyes watching as bits of unidentifiable lumps floated around his fingers in the sink. "Her name is Jane, and she's not here to hurt us."
"God damn it Sammy!" Dean swore and Sam heard the thump of something—probably his shoe, being thrown against the wall near the bathroom door. "She's not some stray puppy or something that you can name and keep or something! She's a ghost, she's dead and sooner or later you and I are going to have to find a way to make her stay dead. We hunt ghosts. We kill them. We don't name them and keep them around."
"Her name is Jane," Sam repeated, his voice firm and he finally found the confidence to look up from the water in the sink and gaze into the mirror once more. His reflection looked back at him, but it wasn't so strange and unfamiliar anymore and he paused to wonder what had changed…but then the steam blew as if an invisible breeze came in through the open door, and he caught the outline of dark hair over his shoulder. "Sam.." a quiet voice whispered, no more than a breath from behind his ear. A smile lifted the corner of his mouth as the grey mist gathered into a pair of dark eyes, her head peaking around his shoulder and the outline of hands, nails in chipped blue polish hovered lightly over his own where they were submersed in water.
"And she's not here to hurt us."
A/N: So I'm completely not even close to finishing this story before the season finale tomorrow. Le sigh. And I know that Kripke is going to wrap up the storyline in some amazing and dramatic way that leaves my pathetic plot line in dust and ashes….BUT, we persevere and carry on. I can't decide whether to write in the last two episodes of this season (aka more obviously steal directly from the show) with my characters, setting, etc. or continue as I planned and just ignore the fact that Kripke's finale is awesome. (Clearly not watching it is also not an option). Gah. Thoughts on my dilemma?
Hope you enjoyed reading! ~Xan