CHAPTER 21

They had decided to give Dean a while to calm down, to get his mind back on straight, but when he didn't return by night fall they all started to worry. Loading up in John's truck, they drove the area, and the surrounding towns, looking for Dean, looking for the impala. They had even stopped and asked every gas station, every motel, every liquor store if they had seen him. With no luck, they headed back to Bobby's.

Dean was smarter than that. He knew the first places they would look would be the surrounding towns, he didn't stop in any of them. He continued to drive on pure emotions. Stopping only when he had the need for fuel. He didn't know where he was going. He didn't know what his plan was. He just knew he needed to go… somewhere.

Dean had made his purchase with cash, no paper trail to be followed. He filled the tank with fuel and bought 2 24 packs of beer, he then made his way to the local liquor store, purchasing as much liquor as he could afford. Then, hit the road again.

Cracking open a beer on the backroads he drowned his emotions with the buzz that had taken over. One pack of beer gone, the morning sun beaming down heavy, and a good feeling running through his veins. He continued to drive to wherever his Baby decided to take him. He opened a bottle of whiskey and drowned out his miserable existence with loud tunes and whiskey.

"Dad! We should be out there looking for Dean!" Sam was not happy that the morning had come and no one had gone to search for his brother.

"If he doesn't want to be found, then he's not going to be." John sighed. "And, since he turned his phone off and the GPS on it, and doesn't seem to be using credit cards, I'd say he doesn't want to be found right now."

"This is all your fault!" Sam yelled at his dad.

"I'm not saying it isn't." John sighed. He knew it was his fault, but Dean was hard headed and had his own way of reacting to things. "I'm sure he'll come back once he's cooled off."

"He's been gone all night; how long does it take to cool off?"

"The boy's right, you know." Bobby chimed in. "And, it's not exactly like Dean is reacting with a solid mind."

"I know that!" John sounded irritated. "But, just where the hell do you expect us to look if there's no trail of him?"

"I don't know, the boy is good at what he does, which includes disappearing." Bobby said as he sat in a chair.

"Exactly." John replied, knowing he had trained his son too well for his own good.

"So, we're just going to sit here, on our asses, while he's out there, who knows where, with a screwed-up head?" Sam was beyond irritated at the whole situation.

"What else do you have in mind?" John questioned.

"I don't know." Sam sighed. "I… I just want my brother back, I want to know he's okay. Dad, you didn't hear him yesterday. He was broken, he told me to go back to the life I wanted, back to college and that he would be gone by the night. And, well, I don't know exactly how he meant that. Yeah, sure he left, but I don't know what his intentions are, and that scares the hell out of me."

"Your brother has enough wits about him to not go somewhere and off himself, he still has you in his head, and I don't think he could ever do that to you." John said, sympathetically.

"Let's hope not." Sam replied as the tears that had been building started to fall.

Bobby had been making phone calls all night, and all morning. He had found nothing. No one had even seen the impala, or Dean. And, there were no credit cards or paper trails to follow.

Day fell into night. Night moved into morning. Morning shifted to midday that found itself falling back into night. Morning, once again. The sun was shining bright, too bright for the mood the men had found themselves in.

It was like, the sun didn't even care that Dean had been missing for 4 days. It didn't care that they were feeling scared and lost. It just continued to shine its brightness into the world.

"You're going to do as I tell you to, is that understood?"

Dean nodded his head, unable to speak.

The man before him just smiled a wicked grin. "Pull your pants down, I want bare ass."

Dean did as he was told.

The man lifted Dean onto the counter top. It was a window, that separated the kitchen from the dining room, barely wide enough for Dean to reach across and grip the opposite edge as his body was bent over. His feet dangled in the air, his pants at his ankles. The man lifted his shirt so his bare back was being exposed too. He swung his belt, making Dean yelp with pain. Again, and again, and again, over and over. Dean muffled his cries as he pressed his face against the hardness of the counter top.

When the man's arm got tired of swinging the belt, he changed hands, striking him more, harder each time. The sting radiated from his lower back, across his butt, and down the backs of his legs. Each strike of the belt just intensified the stinging sensation.

It felt like hours had passed, if Dean was old enough to know time, it would have felt like hours, but, he was only six and a half an hour had felt like several. The man struck every exposed area over and over. Dean was sure he wouldn't be able to sit down for a month.

The man finally grabbed Dean's shoulders and threw his little body on the floor.

"Get your ass to your room!" he shouted.

Dean scrambled to his feet, trying to tug his pants up as he rushed to the safety of his room. Closing the door behind him, Sam didn't waste anytime running up to Dean, wrapping his little arms around him.

"I s'rry Dee." He said.

"It's okay." Dean tried to comfort his little brother while he sniffled back his own tears.

"I won't spill my juice 'gain." He pouted.

"Don't worry about it, Sammy. It's okay."

Dean hated this place, he hated the people who were supposed to be taking care of him, and he hated his dad for abandoning them, he hated him for leaving them with such mean people.

A sharp kick to Dean's side woke him from the nightmare that overtook his thoughts. He cracked his eyes opened. The dim light in the building was almost blinding. He looked around. He wasn't sure where he was at. He didn't know when he had stopped driving.

He realized he was… on a bed? Or… a mattress? In…. some type of a building… an abandoned warehouse of some type. There were other people around. Some of them on mattresses too. They were having sex, in front of everyone.

Dean reached up and grabbed his head, the pain that shot through his temples was enough to make him feel sick.

"Here, drink up!" A man kneeling beside him said as he handed him a bottle of… whiskey?

Dean gladly accepted it, he was so confused, he wasn't sure what was going on or where he was, but the whiskey would certainly help with the headache. He tried to give it back but the man laughed and pushed the bottle back against Dean's mouth, pushing it upwards to pour the liquid into his mouth.

"I said drink up." The man said as Dean was forced to swallow the whiskey down as it burned the back of his throat, settling heavy in his stomach.

Once it was empty the man took the bottle. "Wwwhere… am… I?" Dean stuttered out.

The man just turned and looked at him and walked away.

Dean wanted to get up but dropped his head back onto the mattress instead. He couldn't seem to think straight, couldn't seem to keep his eyes opened, to stay awake. He forced his eyes back open and with much protest from his head and body he pushed himself to a seated position. He looked around some more.

The place was dirty. It was beyond dirty. There were mattresses that surrounded the walls. They were filthy, like 100 people had already had sex on them, or at least that's what it looked like, and judging by the activity going on around him, he was probably right.

He realized, he was sitting on one of those mattresses. Oh god, he was sure he was going to get some infection just by being in this place. He needed to leave. He tried to force himself to stand up. Once he had almost pushed himself to a complete standing position, he felt a tug on his leg. Looking down, clearing his blurry vision, he saw a chain that had been wrapped around his ankle.

"Son of a bitch!" He mumbled as he fell back onto the mattress. His head was spinning, his vision blurred. Clothes… he wasn't wearing enough clothes. He honestly couldn't seem to figure out what was missing, he just knew something was missing. His head was in a fog, too foggy to think, too foggy to concentrate.

Someone was approaching him, maybe they would know where he was and what was going on? He was going to ask. He really was. But, he couldn't get the words to form in his mouth. He couldn't get the thoughts to connect in his brain.

The person who was approaching him had come close, too close. But, maybe he was close enough if Dean whispered his question the man could hear it. If it was a man. He was sure it was. He was heavy enough to be a man. Heavy, on his body.

When did his face get pushed into the mattress he was laying on? When had the weights been put on his back? When had the…. The pain? The pain… pain… something was hurting… but what? What was going on? He… he couldn't… couldn't think… couldn't hold his eyes opened… couldn't stay awake…

John's phone rang, an unknown number, he jumped to answer it. Usually, he wouldn't answer it, he would screen his calls, let them go to voicemail first. But, with his oldest son missing for so many days, he couldn't miss the possibility of it being him.

"Hello, this is John."

"John, this is Detective Smith from the Lawrence Police Department. I'm sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if by chance you had a son who had went missing?"

John's heart stopped, he was sure it had skipped more than one beat, as he put the phone on speaker.

"Yes sir, his name is Dean."

"I see, is there any way you could meet with me?"

"I'm about a day's drive away, is my boy okay? We've been looking everywhere for him."

"Well, that's what I needed to talk to you about. I believe he's alive, yes, but we have a group that is… well, is in the hospital, and when I went through this phone, I dialed the number that was saved as 'dad'. I believe I know which man the phone belongs to, but can't be completely certain. Sir, if you could please come meet with me, I can discuss this further."

"Yes sir, I'll be there by morning."

John hung up the phone, his face appeared as heavy as his heart.

"Kansas?" Sam said with a gasp. "What the hell is he doing there?"

John shook his head. "I don't know, but by the sounds of it, he's found something to get himself into."

The three men packed their bags and headed out to meet with the detective. John was beyond nervous. He couldn't handle the thought of his son being in the hospital again, and if he was unable to tell the detective who he was then it was bad.

He knew Dean would keep his identity as secret as he could, but the detective said he had to search through his phone, and he wasn't completely sure who's phone it was. That meant Dean wasn't able to call them himself or identify his own phone. Oh, this was so not good!

Sam wouldn't stop with the questions. John knew he was just as worried about Dean as he was, but damn that kid could ask what color the sky was, then argue about how it's really not blue, it's a mix of yellow and green. John didn't have the energy for that, not right now. He had too much going through his head, too much to worry about.

Yes, John had messed up, again. He knew that. Sam had made sure that John knew that. He wouldn't let him forget. The men had worn thin on their patience with each other. They had spent countless hours doing nothing but worrying about Dean, searching for him, making call after call, and somehow, for some reason, Dean had ended up where it all started. He was back in his old hometown. The one place he was determined not to return.

Why? Why had he gone there? Why was he back where he didn't want to be? Was he feeling that lost? Maybe he was searching for something. His mom? Perhaps? Maybe he needed the comfort of a family he had lost. But, the family had been broken for so many years, there really wasn't any comfort to give. Or, at least, that's the way it felt most of the time.

John was thankful Bobby volunteered to drive. He couldn't even seem to keep his thoughts straight. He would not have been able to concentrate on the road. He wondered if Dean had felt the same way, if he just blindly drove to wherever he ended up at. Maybe, he didn't realize he was going back home? Maybe that's just where his car had taken him?

He needed to get to his son. He needed his questions answered, he needed to make sure he was okay, was alive. The way it had sounded over the phone, there may have been some people in this 'group' that weren't alive, and the detective wasn't completely sure that Dean wasn't one of them, so until he knew for sure, he wasn't going to give him any false sense of hope.

But, that's all the Winchesters had lived on for so long, a false sense of hope. A false sense of security. A false sense of safety. Was this really any different? Dean could have been attacked by a vampire or werewolf just as easily as he could have found himself captured again. There was no telling the dangers they put themselves in every day.

Maybe Dean was on a hunt? Maybe the 'group' wasn't a group, maybe it was a nest or a family of monsters, if so, had they turned Dean? Is that why he couldn't communicate with the detective?

John's head was aching. He had spent too many hours awake, worrying, and now this. Too many questions and no answers. No answers until they met with the detective. The thing is, John couldn't even just go to the hospital to see his son, because he wouldn't have been under any certain name. John doe probably, maybe even with a number after it, if there was a group of unidentified.

Sam had fallen asleep. His worrying and anxiety got the best of him. He couldn't manage to continue functioning. His mind had shut down and his body followed quickly behind. John wished his could do the same. This feeling… he had never felt anything worse. The uncertainty. The fact that Dean was just healing from a major ordeal, and now, he's in the hospital, again. With who knows what injuries.

John rubbed his hands down his tired face, looking at the darkness of the night from the window, he laid his head against the coolness of the glass, closing his eyes against the pressure that continued to build inside.

"Boy, you need to learn how to grow the hell up! You are not a baby anymore. You're not a little kid! You're older and you should act older. Stop your damn crying, before I give you something to cry about! I don't give a shit what you think, get over it!"

I never was a kid… I never was a kid… I never was a kid… I never was a kid… grown up too fast… sacrificed too much…. I did what I had to do… I never was a kid… I never was a kid… I never was a kid… never a kid… never a kid…

John drew in a deep breath, startling himself from a sleep he didn't know he had fallen into. He pulled his head against the window, as if it had burned him, and sat straighter in his seat.

Bobby took his eyes off the road for a moment, glancing at John to make sure he was okay, then focused back on the road.

"We're about 2 hours out." Bobby informed him.

He sounded tired, exhausted was more like it, they were all exhausted. John looked in the back seat and Sam was still asleep. He rubbed his hands down his face, trying to clear his thoughts from the dream. He looked out the side window. The morning sun was starting to creep into the sky. The darkness was lifting, allowing the sun to beam its mocking warmth upon John's cold heart.

He just needed to make sure his son was okay. That's the only thing that mattered right now. Dean had to be okay. He was always okay. He was always okay.

"He's always okay." John whispered to himself, barely loud enough for Bobby to hear.

"Yeah, he is." Bobby agreed as he drove on toward the boy, their boy, who had been missing for so long.