Get It While You Can
Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural. All I got to my name is Jayne and Lynn.
Rating: T
AN: Thanks to deansbabygirl934, SingingInTheRain1989, angeleyenc, impalame, legrowl, Heavenstar3, Little Rock-n-Roll Queen, Padme4000, A person, Nelle07, Savannah101, Joan J., and Strangler000 for the reviews!
"Asylum"
Chapter 25: Asylum
Jayne narrowed her eyes at the dark road ahead of her as she drove her truck through quiet, lazy downtown Rockford, leaving the dive bar behind and taking the route back to their motel. She glanced up at the rearview mirror, catching sight of Dean's Impala behind her, and pressed her lips into a tight, tense line again. She looked sideways at her tipsy stepsister. Lynn was rolling down the truck window, letting the cool night air blow through the cab, and holding a cigarette in her hand.
"I thought you quit," Jayne remarked.
"I did," Lynn replied, lighting the cigarette. "Now I only smoke when I drink."
"Oh," Jayne returned dryly. "That… that's really inspiring."
"Uh, excuse you, I've caught you doing the same damn thing, so... don't judge me," Lynn retorted, inhaling deeply on her cigarette, and then trailing off like she couldn't figure out what to say next. "You… bitch," she settled on lamely.
Jayne snorted and rolled her eyes, unimpressed. Then she heaved a sigh, glancing at her stepsister again. "I'm not judging you," she said, trying to sound concerned or sympathetic, rather than her old standard annoyed. "I'm just saying… you have not been acting like yourself. Drinking, yeah. Seen you do that. Smoking when you drink – seen that too. But drinking when we have a job? That's a new one."
"What?" Lynn snapped, taking a long drag. "I can't have fun?"
"No, you can have fun. But… you're not."
There was a long silence. "Lynn," Jayne said finally. "What's wrong?"
For a long time, Lynn said nothing. She shifted around in the passenger seat, and Jayne saw the end of her cigarette glow in the dark as she sucked down on it again. Eventually Lynn asked, in a tiny, quiet voice, "Jaynie, what do you know about my mom?"
Jayne blinked. She frowned at the windshield, and glanced at Lynn out of the corner of her eye. She didn't reply right away – she couldn't reply right away. She was more than a little surprised by the question. Lynn turned to her, watching her expectantly, and Jayne bit back an annoyed comment about not spilling ash on her upholstery.
"Your mom?" she repeated after a moment's pause.
"Yeah," Lynn said. "My mom. My birth mom. You know, Inez Rodriguez."
It was a strange question, to say the least. Lynn had never asked it before. In fact, they rarely mentioned Inez Rodriguez. Russ had never mentioned her. Jayne barely remembered her. All she could recall was a vague impression of dark eyes and smoky hair and the soft clinking of jewelry.
"I don't really know anything about her," Jayne replied honestly. "Why are you asking?"
"Why can't I?" Lynn demanded.
Jayne glanced at her stepsister again, taken back. "I didn't say you couldn't. It's just… not once, in our entire lives, have you ever asked me that question. In fact… I don't think I remember you even asking Russ about your mom."
It seemed Lynn didn't know how to answer. She began to stutter. "Well… I don't… it's just… with everything that's been happening lately, I just thought… I'd like to know something about my family."
Jayne nodded slowly. She supposed that made sense. Still, the question felt too random. Out of place. "I'm sorry, Lynn," she told her stepsister. "Russ never told me anything about her."
There was another long silence. "Did you check his notes?" Jayne asked suddenly, struck by inspiration. "Maybe…"
"That's just it!" Lynn practically exploded. "I've been over every single flash drive with a fine tooth comb! There's nothing there, Jayne! He writes about her once! Once, in over thirty years worth of notes!"
"You checked all of them?"
"Yes!"
"All of them?"
Lynn sniffed in annoyance. "Well, Jayne, you had me stranded on the side of the road for three hours. I got bored."
"You got really, really bored," Jayne returned, but she didn't think it was possible for Lynn to have looked through all of Russ's notes in the time it took to get Janis running again, which only meant that this whole business about her mother had been nagging at Lynn for quite some time.
"Today, Inez gave birth to our daughter: Lynnette Marcella Rodriguez Juarez," Lynn recited next to her, flicking ash out the window. "I think I'll just call the poor kid Lynn."
Jayne snorted. "I guess Russ did have a sense of humor."
"Why wouldn't he say anything else?" Lynn demanded. "That was literally the only thing he wrote about her! I mean, Ana's all over those notes!"
"Well, there's a reason for that," Jayne rationalized. "Everything on those flash drives is from Russ's hunting notebooks. He only wrote about the things he hunted. And since he'd been hunting whatever killed my mom for about sixteen years before he died, then yeah. I'd guess he would mention her a lot."
"But…"
"I mean, maybe it's a good thing Inez isn't in there. Maybe that means your mom was completely one hundred percent normal. She and your dad had a completely one hundred percent normal relationship and everything was just fine and completely one hundred percent normal."
Even as she spoke, Jayne knew she wasn't convincing anybody. Hell, she wasn't even convincing herself; she was rambling, and it sounded like she was grasping at straws. Not that Jayne was in denial about Lynn's mother. They truly had no reason to think Inez Rodriguez was in any way connected to anything supernatural. But considering their family's track record, well…
"Maybe," her stepsister murmured uncertainly.
"Maybe?" Jayne repeated. "What, you think I'm wrong?"
"I don't know," Lynn retorted. "I mean, maybe everything was normal. Or maybe… maybe Dad just didn't want us to know exactly how weird things actually were."
There was a long silence. "Well," Jayne said finally. "That's an unsettling thought."
They fell silent again and remained so for the rest of the drive. Jayne steered Janis into the motel lot and parked outside the room she and Lynn were sharing. Dean's Impala pulled in beside them two seconds later.
Jayne glowered out the window at the two boys as they climbed out of their car and headed towards their room. Well, actually she glowered at Dean.
"Jackass," she muttered.
Lynn snorted. "You're an idiot."
Jayne swung her head around to look at her. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me," Lynn said, getting out of the truck. Jayne followed suit. "You know he didn't do anything wrong. All he did was fix Janis."
"He didn't fix dick," she retorted, suddenly remembering that she still needed a damn fuel pump. The thought put her in an even worse mood.
Lynn didn't get the memo. "He helped you, Jaynie," she insisted, leading the way to their motel room door, and Jayne made a face at her back. "He did something nice for you."
"It wasn't nice!" Jayne exploded. "It was… he was…"
"Oh come off it," Lynn rolled her eyes. "I mean really, Jayne. Sometimes you're going to need help. Everybody does. There's nothing wrong with that. And if our friends offer to help us, there's nothing wrong with letting them – even if that friend is Dean Winchester."
These were words Jayne didn't want to hear. "You're drunk," she accused her stepsister.
Lynn shrugged, pitching her cigarette butt to the side. Jayne watched it land in the middle of the sidewalk. "Maybe," Lynn replied, unlocking the door. "Maybe I'm drunk. But I'm also right."
Then she opened the door and stepped inside, leaving Jayne out on the sidewalk to stew.
Lynn awoke the next morning with an aching head and a bad taste in her mouth.
She sat up slowly in her bed, squinting against the bright sunlight streaming in through the window, her hand immediately going up to shield her eyes. She kicked the almost white sheets away from her and looked over at the nightstand. Water and aspirin were waiting for her, and Lynn smiled gratefully, glancing at the bathroom door.
The shower was running, and the door was shut, and Lynn silently thanked her stepsister as she popped the pills and chugged the water. Then she dragged herself out of bed and headed for the window, where she tugged the ugly, cheap, dark green curtains shut, blocking out the morning sun and casting the motel room in darkness.
It was ugly in that motel room like it was ugly in every motel room, and Lynn heaved a sigh, rubbing her aching head. Everything was cheap and dark, with the walls covered in hideous maroon wallpaper freckled with tiny white dots, and if she stared at it too long, it hurt her eyes. The duvets and the carpet matched the curtains, the fake wood furniture was espresso dark, and the mattresses on the beds were sagging.
"Just once, I'd like to stay somewhere nice," she grumbled, stumbling back to her bed. She caught her reflection in the mirror as she passed, and she grimaced; her hair was half a tangle, part of it still up in yesterday's ponytail, and yesterday's mascara was smeared all around her eyes and streaking down her cheeks, making her look like a sad raccoon.
The shower shut off in the bathroom, and Lynn threw herself face down on the bed, groaning into her pillow as she waited for her stepsister to finish in the bathroom and get out of there.
Ten minutes later, the door creaked open, and Lynn looked up as Jayne stepped into the room, fully dressed, with wet hair. She stared at Jayne, and Jayne stared back, and then her stepsister snorted. "Yikes," she said, deadpan.
Lynn made a face at her. "Shut up."
"You might want to get in there," Jayne said, jerking her head towards the bathroom. "Because we're going to check out Roosevelt Asylum soon, and you look… you look… honestly, there are no words."
"Shut up," Lynn groused again. She dragged herself out of the bed and stumbled towards the bathroom as Jayne headed towards her own bed, where her duffel bag was sitting wide open. "I already feel like crap; I don't need you to tell me I look like it too."
"Steer clear of the mirror."
"Ha, ha."
She slammed the door shut behind her and turned on the shower.
The night played itself back on a loop as she got ready, showering away the hangover. When the night had begun, the plan had not been to get drunk. The plan had been to do her job. The plan had been to not worry about Missouri Mosley and her haunting words of wisdom. The plan had been to not obsess over her mom. The plan was certainly not to think about Sam, and how hard he was to read, how he'd dragged Dean off to rescue her (and Jayne too, she supposed) from the side of the road, or how he'd confided in her about his father, and invited her along on another job.
Plans change.
She could remember how the bar blurred and the dim lights turned to star bursts, and how she'd made an ass out of herself in front of the Winchester boys… more specifically, Sam… but really, the largest issue of last night was what she'd said to Jayne.
Lynn honestly didn't care if she made an ass out of herself in front of her stepsister; it was just Jayne, after all, and they'd been on the road together too long now for Lynn to be embarrassed about drinking too much in front of her. But the questions Lynn had asked about her mother… she hadn't meant to bring it up yet, and certainly not the way she had, and possibly not ever.
Too many minutes later, after she'd stepped out of the shower and thrown on some clothes, Lynn stepped out of the bathroom with her wet hair hanging down around her shoulders, and found an impatient Jayne waiting by the door. "About ready?" she demanded. "We should be leaving like now."
"Yeah," Lynn replied, giving her stepsister a shaky smile and taking in a deep, fortifying breath. "Let's go."
She wondered if she could just pretend their conversation last night had never happened and be let off the hook discussing it. It was Jayne, after all, so she was betting the odds were in her favor.
They headed out into the parking lot, and clambered into Janis. Lynn cringed a bit as Jayne started the truck up, but the engine roared to life like yesterday's mishap had never happened. She could see the boys getting into their shiny black Chevy a few spaces down, and soon they were following them down the road in silence.
Industrial buildings and empty parking lots and chain-link fences whizzed past as they drove along, each in worse shape than the last as they traveled through various levels of deterioration, getting further away from the main part of town and closer to the outskirts. Lynn stared out the window, watching the crumbling buildings and the steel-gray sky fly by.
"So," Jayne suddenly spoke, and Lynn automatically tensed. She heard Jayne take a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Um... look, Lynn… about last night…"
"I don't want to talk about last night," Lynn interrupted tersely.
Jayne scoffed at her, and Lynn shot her a dirty look over her shoulder. "Do you even remember last night?" Jayne retorted.
"Of course I remember!" Lynn snapped, legitimately offended. "I was tipsy, not loaded out of my mind!"
"Fine, so then you remember the drive back to our motel and all the stuff you asked me about your mom?"
"Ugh," Lynn rolled her eyes and slumped against the truck door. "I was so hoping if I didn't talk about it, you wouldn't. Since when do you talk about things?"
"Since when do you not?" Jayne returned, and Lynn faltered a little when she realized her stepsister actually sounded concerned about her.
"Just… just forget it, ok?" Lynn replied quietly, trying to be gentle about it. "I drank a little too much, and… and I don't know, all this digging around in our family's sordid history lately… it just got me thinking and nostalgic and… I don't know, wistful? It wasn't important."
Jayne glanced at her out of the corner of her eye and then frowned at the road ahead of them. Lynn could tell she didn't really buy it, and she couldn't blame her; she wasn't exactly being honest. She wasn't sure why she couldn't just tell her about Missouri, but… well, maybe that would make the whole thing too real. It would force her into a decision she wasn't ready to make.
"Ok…" Jayne said slowly, sounding unconvinced, but she let the subject drop. Lynn twisted her hand in her necklace again. They rode the rest of the way in silence, until Jayne finally parked behind Dean's car on the side of the road and shut down her engine, just a few feet down the street from Roosevelt Asylum.
Roosevelt Asylum was a condemned brick and concrete building, looking like a once-grand cathedral that was now crumbling into nothing, with sweeping arch work all over the front of the building and two sets of front steps that led to the main entrance. The old building was tacked all over with warning signs, and surrounded by a chain-link fence with barbed wire at the top. Lynn wrinkled her nose at the dilapidated building, watching as Sam and Dean headed for the fence and climbed over the top, dropping down into the mostly concrete yard.
"Yeah… no," she said. "Not doing that."
Jayne rolled her eyes and got out of the truck, and Lynn eyed the fence as she too hopped down from the cab and headed over to the building. She spotted a hole in the fence, obviously manmade, probably by teenagers looking for a place to party, and she pulled the chain-link wider in order to squeeze through it. Jayne followed her into the yard, and up the front steps, and they found Sam and Dean waiting for them at the top of the stairs, by what was once a boarded-up door.
"Good morning," Dean greeted them too brightly, smirking knowingly at her, and Lynn contemplated kicking him in the shin.
"Hi," she retorted.
Jayne, predictably, grunted.
"Why so grumpy?" Dean asked oh-so-innocently.
"I'm not."
"Tired? Headache? Maybe a little nauseous?"
Lynn glared at him. Behind him, Sam noticeably rolled his eyes. "I'm fine," Lynn practically growled at Dean. "I barely even drank anything!"
Truthfully, her head was pounding a bit, but she chalked at least half that up to Dean being an annoying jerk. She shoved past him and Sam, not giving Dean a chance to reply, and pried open the old, heavy metal doors.
The creak of the rusty hinges echoed through the long, lonely, cavernous hallway. Lynn made a face at the old, musty smell of the place, and at the dusty, grimy interior, spackled all over with spray-paint graffiti, and then, against her better judgment, she led the way inside.
They tramped into what Lynn supposed was once the main lobby. There was a booth-like structure on the left, the service window glass shattered, and a stairwell in front of them, littered with beer bottles and other assorted trash. Everything was dim and dark and dirty. The gloom of the place was heavy, like they were walking through a fog.
On their right was another set of grimy, barred double doors, decorated with more graffiti, and with South Wing emblazoned on the wall above them in tall, red block letters. There were chains wrapped loosely around the door handles, with the bolts broken, obviously cut into by, again Lynn guessed, bored teenagers.
"Apparently the police chased the kids to here," Sam was saying as they approached the doors. "The South Wing."
Lynn wrinkled her nose at the entrance. "Great. So we have to go in there," she grumbled. Jayne rolled her eyes.
"Wait a second," Dean murmured, whipping out his father's journal from inside his jacket. Lynn wrinkled her nose at him instead. He flipped through the old, weathered pages of the notebook, and then started reading out loud. "In 1972, three kids broke into the South Wing. Only one survived. Way he tells it, one of his friends went nuts and started lighting up the place."
"So whatever's going on," Sam mused. "The South Wing seems to be the heart of it."
"Yeah, but if kids are spelunking the asylum, why aren't there a ton more deaths?" Dean countered.
Lynn's eyes drifted to the broken chains at the seam of the double doors. "Looks like the doors are usually chained," Sam said from directly behind her. "Could have been chained up for years."
"Yeah, to keep people out," Dean agreed, snapping the journal shut. "Or to keep something in."
Sam pushed the door open slightly, and the creak echoed through the stillness and the gloom. Lynn made another face, but she pushed past both the brothers as they stood there, staring at each other. "Let's just get this crap over with," she grumbled, stepping into the South Wing.
"Well," she heard Dean's voice echo down the long corridor from behind her. "I guess that means we're going in."
Lynn ignored him and started to walk. Everyone followed her, judging by the echo of footsteps in the hallway, and the bang of the door slamming behind them. She cringed and rubbed her temples as she marched down the hallway, briefly tempted to put on her sunglasses, even as dim and gloomy as it was in there. Honestly, she just wanted to get this over with already; check out the asylum, figure out what they were supposed to salt and burn, and then take a nap. Or drink a pot of coffee. Or chug a two-liter of Diet Coke.
She wondered absently if her cigarettes were still in Jayne's truck.
The hallway was littered with abandoned, over-turned hospital equipment, like everyone had run out on the place in a serious hurry. Lynn skirted around an old-fashioned wheelchair, grimacing as she got too close to the wall. There was some kind of growth on the walls, probably just some aggressive limescale, but it was nothing she planned on touching. Behind her, she heard some lackluster mechanical whirring, and assumed Dean had pulled out his EMF reader.
"Hey, tell me if you see any dead people, Haley Joel," she heard Dean crack, and she rolled her eyes.
"Dude, enough," Sam snapped.
Dean chuckled, clearly not cowed by Sam's impatient tone. "No, I'm serious. You got to be careful, all right? Ghosts are attracted to that whole ESP thing you got going on."
"I told you, it's not ESP, I just have… strange vibes sometimes. Weird dreams."
"Yeah…" Jayne drawled from the back of the line, and Lynn shot a dark look over her shoulder in anticipation of her stepsister's smartassery. "Pretty sure that's practically the definition of ESP, though… so…"
Dean snorted, and Sam stuttered out an offended retort. "No, it's not… that isn't… look, I'm not psychic, ok!"
"Yeah, whatever," Dean returned. "Don't ask, don't tell."
Lynn huffed out an annoyed scoffing noise, rolling her eyes again, and said over her shoulder, against her better judgment, "That is so not what that means."
Sam heaved one of his long-suffering sighs, and Lynn rather thought he had a lot of nerve; if anyone got to heave long-suffering sighs around here this morning, it was going to be her. "You getting any readings on that thing or not?" he asked Dean.
"Nope," his brother returned, popping the p. "Of course, that doesn't mean nobody's home."
"Spirits can't appear during certain hours of the day," Sam agreed.
"Yeah, the freaks come out at night," Dean quipped. "Hey, Sam, who's the hotter psychic? Patricia Arquette, Jennifer Love Hewitt, or you?"
There was a sound like Sam had hauled off and smacked him, and then Dean's chuckle echoed through the corridor. Lynn rolled her eyes yet again, finally reaching the end of the hallway, and she shoved her way through the double doors waiting for her, stepping into a large room that was darker and, unfortunately, much stinkier than the rest of the asylum.
"Gross," she grumbled, putting her hand over her nose and picking her way through more abandoned equipment, several decades past its prime, past old-fashioned doctor's exam chairs and battered wooden tables… and then she saw the jars, sitting in a line on an old, long table, each one full of preservation liquids and… oh.
"Ew!" she exclaimed, both hands covering her mouth and stifling a gag, and then she turned away and back towards the doors so quickly she collided with Sam and Dean. "Ugh, so gross, sorry…"
Both boys looked at her like she was insane. "Are you ok?" Sam asked uncertainly.
"Uh-huh, yeah, fine… just… there's… ugh, body parts in jars, ok? Body parts in jars!"
Sam frowned at her, and Dean smirked. "Sounds like good times," he returned, and pushed past her into the gross, smelly, creepy room.
Lynn echoed him in a deep, unintelligible, mocking mutter, rolling her eyes. Sam smiled at her. "Are you ok?" he asked again.
"Fine, fine," she waved him off, and Sam nodded once before following his brother further into the room. Lynn folded her arms over her chest, and met Jayne's eyes, who looked predictably amused at her expense.
"Do you want to wait in the truck?" she asked, voice flat like a pancake.
"No!" Lynn hissed at her, annoyed. "I'm fine, damn it!"
Jayne half-smirked and headed straight for the table of jars with disgusting things inside them, and Lynn rolled her eyes yet again, turning her back on all of them with her arms still folded tight over her chest. She decided to just look at the ceiling.
"Man," Dean said as he wandered the room. "Electro-shock, lobotomies… they did some twisted stuff to these people."
Lynn still refused to turn around, but she did make a sound that was meant to be agreement, although admittedly it just sounded like nausea.
"Kind of like my man Jack in Cuckoo's Nest," Dean drawled, adopting what she supposed was a (terrible) Jack Nicholson impression. She cringed. She had to cringe; it was cringe-worthy.
Her stepsister rolled her eyes at him, but Sam ignored his brother completely. Dean faltered a bit and changed the subject. "So, what do we think? The ghosts are possessing people?"
"Maybe," Sam replied. "Maybe it's more like, uh… like Amityville, or the Smurl haunting."
"Yeah," Dean murmured offhand. "Spirits driving them insane. Kinda like my man Jack in The Shining."
"Please stop," Jayne deadpanned, without even looking up from the jars of grossness.
Dean sneered at her, but thankfully reserved comment. Otherwise Lynn supposed there would have been another shouting match that made no sense, like yesterday's embarrassment on the side of the road. Lynn looked at him, and at Sam, and then at Jayne, and twisted up her face in repulsion as she watched Jayne pick up a jar.
"Ew, oh my god, put that down!" she exclaimed.
Jayne rolled her eyes at Lynn this time, but did as ordered. She skirted around the table and headed back towards Lynn's relatively safe side of the room, and not a moment too soon.
"Dean," Sam said suddenly. "When are we going to talk about it?"
"Talk about what?"
"About the fact that Dad's not here."
Lynn cringed again. She looked at Jayne, who lifted her brows, and started examining an old hospital chair.
"Oh… uh… let's see…" Dean returned sarcastically. "Never?"
"I'm being serious, man."
"So am I, Sam! Look, he sent us here, he obviously wants us here... we'll just have to pick up the search later."
Lynn knew that was no sort of answer Sam was going to accept, and Sam proved it within seconds. "It doesn't matter what he wants," he retorted, taking a confrontational step forward, but Dean was ready with the quips and the avoidance.
"See? That attitude? Right there? That's why I always got the extra cookie."
"Dad could be in trouble! We should be looking for him. We deserve some answers, Dean! I mean, this is our family we're talking about!"
"I understand that, Sam! But he's given us an order."
"So, what, we've always got to follow Dad's orders?"
"Of course we do!"
There was a long, tense silence, as Sam glared at his brother, and Dean turned his back on Sam. "Wow," Lynn whispered to her stepsister, widening her eyes. "So awkward."
But her whisper echoed loudly through the creepy room, and earned her glares from both Winchester brothers. Lynn winced at them apologetically, and Jayne snorted. "Man, does your voice carry," she murmured, and Lynn smacked her in the shoulder.
Then there was clunking and clacking, and Lynn chanced a look over her shoulder, finding that both boys had moved on from her faux-pas, and Dean was lifting up an old, engraved metallic nameplate. "Sanford Ellicott," he read aloud. "You know what we got to do? We got to find out more about the South Wing. See if something happened here."
Then he shoved the nameplate into Sam's stomach, who caught it on instinct, and he pushed past his little brother, marching towards the exit.
There was a definite saltiness in the air as they followed him through the double doors and down the long, decaying corridor again, with Dean walking at a brisk pace several feet ahead of the rest of them, and Sam shuffling along with his hands jammed in his coat pockets just ahead of her, positively sulking. Lynn rolled her eyes for what felt like the three thousandth time that morning.
Don't go to him, she told herself. You don't want to deal with this today. Just don't do it to yourself, Lynn.
But it turned out she didn't have to go to him because instead, he came to her. He slowed down and fell into step beside her, watching as Jayne passed them, clearly seeking her out.
It's friendly, she told herself. We're friends. He's just going to bitch about his brother, anyway.
And wow, how right she was.
"Sorry about that," Sam murmured, once Jayne was out of earshot.
"Sorry about what?" she returned, and maybe it was the slight, lingering hangover that made her lose control over her tongue, or Missouri's cryptic crap about her mother that was occupying her thoughts and distracting her, making her forget how to be diplomatic. "I mean, clearly you weren't too concerned about fighting in front of us back there, because otherwise you wouldn't have brought it up in the first place."
Sam looked a little taken aback, and she almost apologized, but then he twitched out a little smile for her and ducked his head. "Ok," he conceded her point. "I guess you're not wrong."
She twitched out a smile of her own. "I guess not." Then she shrugged, folding her arms over her chest again and focusing on the cement beneath her boots. "I mean, it's fine, really. It's not like Jayne and I have never gotten into it in front of the two of you."
"Yeah," he murmured. "It's just… sometimes, I just don't understand him. I don't understand how he can be so calm about all this."
"I'm sure he's not," Lynn reasoned. "He's probably just as upset as you are. I think he just sees things a little differently, that's all."
"That's all?" Sam repeated incredulously. "No. No, that's not all. You heard him, didn't you? He's just perfectly willing to follow Dad's orders, without question, even though he knows Dad's wrong."
Sam shook his head, and Lynn wasn't sure what to say, so she said nothing. It didn't matter; Sam didn't need encouragement. "He has to know Dad's wrong," he vented to her as they followed Dean and Jayne out of the asylum, both of them giving the other a wide berth. "But that's Dean; he never could stand up to Dad. Of course, when it comes to me, Dean never has any problem telling me I'm wrong. Telling me what to do." He sighed heavily, kicking at something on the floor. "Sometimes I think he's just like Dad."
"That's a little harsh," Lynn replied, and not exactly delicately. She couldn't help it; comforting and reassuring and sympathetic were eluding her today. "I doubt Dean would ever pick up in the middle of the night and bail on you. He doesn't have it in him."
"That's not the point!"
"Sure it is," Lynn returned. "Your father bailed on you, didn't explain why, and still expects you to follow orders. That's the real reason you're so upset. Dean's bossy, granted, but he's not the drill sergeant you make your father out to be."
Sam gawked at her.
"Besides, as much as your dad's being an ass right now?" Lynn went on. "This is still a case, and people here are still dying. Don't get me wrong; if I was in your shoes, I'd be every bit as pissed as you are. But still… we can't leave, you know. Not without finishing the job."
Sam didn't like what she had to say; Lynn could tell. Honestly, she didn't care. She was hungover and tired and kind of hungry, and Sam's complaints were just old hat Sam standards by now. It wasn't a kind thing to think, but Lynn wasn't in the mood to be kind. She was always trying to be kind, trying to do the right thing and say the right thing, and not come off like a rude, socially inept jerk-off, because Jayne already had that area covered, thank you, and they really didn't need both of them alienating people everywhere they went. But Lynn wasn't up to it today; she couldn't be the nice, chirpy, interested one. She had her own shit going on.
"Yeah, I guess you're right," Sam finally said, bemusedly, after a long pause. "But… we have to find our Dad. We can't be taking every job that comes along and ignoring his absence."
Privately, Lynn thought he had a lot of nerve saying shit like that to her of all people, when he knew she couldn't find her brother, when he knew she'd never give up looking for her brother, when he knew that she was taking every job that came along in an effort to distract herself because she didn't know what to do next, and honestly? She wasn't sure what Sam thought he was going to do to track down John Winchester when the man clearly didn't want to be found.
She didn't say any of that out loud, but it was a close thing.
"Maybe… since you guys are here… maybe you can take over the hunt," he suggested, and Lynn bristled a bit, stopping short in the moldering corridor and gawking at him. "I mean, if he knew someone was going to stop what was going on here, then maybe I could convince Dean to leave and get back to looking for Dad…"
It stung a little, and Lynn wondered if this had been Sam's plan all along. Maybe he wasn't interested in working a job with her; maybe he didn't think of her as an actual friend. Maybe he'd gone into this hunt pissed and sour about John's order disguised as a text message, and he'd seen her and Jayne as an opportunity to pass the buck, so he could get back to doing what Sam wanted to do.
But ultimately, Lynn had no intention of storming off this job when there were lives at stake, so she swallowed down her anger and replied, in a tight voice, "I mean, if you think he'd go for that, sure. Jayne and I can definitely take care of this. But honestly, I really don't think Dean is going to go for that. Do you?"
Sam blinked a little, and then his shoulders sagged and he heaved a sigh. "No," he agreed unhappily, shoving his hands in his pockets. "I guess not."
"Well, then I guess you're stuck with us," Lynn said too brightly, and then she turned away from him and walked at a brisker pace down the hallway, hoping to catch up with Dean and Jayne.
She wasn't here to be his sounding board, or to be his clean-up crew and finish the jobs he didn't want to take, so he could run off and do something else. That wasn't what she agreed to when she came out here to Rockford, and she also hadn't agreed to be tossed in the middle of whatever Winchester family drama was playing out right now. Not again.
She had her own problems.
Dr. James Ellicott's psychiatric office had been modern and clean, all in white, black and gray, with walls of windows that had showcased the view of the city below, the stormy gray sky above, and the spring rain that fell the entire time Sam had sat in the waiting room, pretending to read a copy of Men's Health.
He'd spent the morning in the Roosevelt Asylum with his brother, and Lynn and Jayne, investigating the abandoned hospital's south wing, and they hadn't found much. It was old, rundown, dirty and mildewy, like any abandoned building would be, but there had been no reading on the EMF and nothing else that screamed ghosts. They had found a clue in the form of the old name plaque that read Dr. Sanford Ellicott. And so, after a long morning of stomping around the dank, dusty asylum and being the butt of Dean's psychic/ESP jokes, Sam had made an appointment here, with Dr. James Ellicott, who he presumed was Sanford Ellicott's son, to find out what he could about the now deceased chief of staff, and the closing of Roosevelt Asylum.
But the appointment hadn't really gone the way he'd planned. The doctor had been frustratingly focused on treating Sam like a patient, and it had been far more difficult to get any answers about Dr. Sanford Ellicott and the Roosevelt Asylum than Sam had anticipated.
"We're on your dollar, Sam. We're here to talk about you," Dr. Ellicott had said when Sam had played the role of local history buff who just happened to recognized the doctor's last name and started asking about an incident that might have happened in the South Wing of the old Roosevelt Asylum.
So he'd played along, talking about the road trip he'd just taken with his brother, without really saying anything about it, of course, and then he'd tried redirecting the conversation back to the asylum... for which the psychiatrist had immediately called him out.
"If you're a local history buff, then you know all about the Roosevelt Riot," Dr. Ellicott had told him. "Now let's cut the bull, shall we? You're avoiding the subject."
Sam had frowned, confused. "What subject?"
"You."
It didn't seem like there was any other way to get the answers he needed, so when the doctor had made him a deal – the whole gruesome story of the Roosevelt Riot in exchange for one honest anecdote about himself – Sam had been forced to comply. He started with the doctor's suggestion - to tell him something about the brother he'd been road-tripping with - and then he hadn't been able to stop. He was still pissed about the confrontation between him and Dean in the asylum that morning. He was still pissed that his father was barking orders from who even knew how many miles away, sending text messages with nothing in them but coordinates. It didn't help that Sam's father clearly wasn't in Rockford. He clearly didn't intend to meet up with them. It also didn't help that Dean wasn't bothered about it. It really didn't help that Dean refused to talk about it. And it didn't help that Lynn, in all her aggravating glory, had taken Dean's side.
Even now, after forty minutes of venting, Sam was still angry. He felt like there was still more he wanted to say. Sam marched out of the office and downstairs to the building's main lobby, still thinking about all the things he'd told Dr. Ellicott, still thinking about Dean and Lynn. That morning, he'd wanted to snap at both of them. He'd wanted to take Dean by the shoulders and shake him, because they weren't kids anymore, and they actually did not have to do everything their father said. He'd wanted to point out the irony of Lynn's words about working the job and saving lives being more important than his disagreement with his father, seeing as they came from someone who had gotten drunk the night before. He had wanted to ask if she'd be snooping around Roosevelt Asylum if it had been her brother texting her coordinates instead. He'd bet good money she would have driven as far away from Rockford as she could get just to spite him. But he didn't say any of those things. He just thought them, fuming silently, balling his hands into fists inside his coat pockets.
He stepped through the building's glass doors and into the damp spring air. It had stopped raining, but the sky was still gray and the pavement was still wet. Dean was leaning impatiently on the floor-to-ceiling windows around the exit, clearly antsy, and he could see Lynn and Jayne in the parking lot, waiting outside of their old gray truck.
"Dude," Dean demanded, falling into step beside Sam as he headed across the parking lot, towards the other two hunters. "You were in there forever! What the hell were you talking about?"
"Just the hospital, you know," Sam replied evasively, because he sure as hell wasn't going to tell Dean all the complaints he'd just voiced about him.
"And?"
Sam shrugged, picking up the pace a little, and waited until Jayne and Lynn were in earshot to tell Dean what he knew. They both perked up a little as he and Dean joined them by the truck, parked right next to the Impala. "So, apparently the south wing was where they housed the real hard cases," he announced. "The psychotics, the criminally insane..."
"Sounds cozy," Dean quipped.
"Yeah, and one night in '64, they rioted. Attacked the staff, attacked each other..."
"What, so the patients took over the asylum?"
"Apparently."
"Any deaths?"
"Some patients. Some staff. I guess it was pretty gory. Some of the bodies were never even recovered... including our chief of staff, Dr. Sanford Ellicott."
"Wait," Lynn interjected, screwing up her face a little. "What do you mean, the bodies were never recovered? I mean, it's just a building. There's only so many places the bodies could be."
Sam shrugged. "The cops scoured every inch of the place, but I guess the patients must have... stuffed the bodies somewhere hidden."
"That's grim," Dean observed.
"And disgusting," Jayne grunted, leaning against her tailgate. Lynn made a nauseated face in agreement.
"So," Sam concluded. "They transferred all the surviving patients and shut down the hospital for good."
"All right, so to sum it up, we have a bunch of violent deaths and a bunch of un-recovered bodies," Dean said.
"We've got a bunch of angry spirits," Sam returned.
"Sounds like good times," Dean replied. "Let's check out the hospital tonight."
Earlier in the day, there'd been little to find in Roosevelt Asylum that could be considered even remotely frightening. It was a grim place, sure, especially cast in dull morning light, and it was scorched and grimy, scattered with broken, antique medical equipment… but none of that equaled terrifying. Now that it was dark out, however, the asylum had changed, and Dean didn't need his brother's freaky mind powers to feel that change in the atmosphere. The temperature inside the asylum was several degrees cooler than it had been outside. As soon as he stepped through the door, Dean felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up straight.
Four flashlights clicked on, illuminating the passage in front of them. It appeared empty, but Dean wasn't buying it. He pulled the EMF reader out of his coat pocket. Immediately the lights began flashing and a whining scratching sound assailed their ears. They all headed down the short hallway that the double doors opened into, and then they reached the fork, where another long hallway ran perpendicular to the first.
"Getting readings?" his brother asked as they turned left down the corridor.
"Yeah, big time," Dean replied.
Sam was focused on the viewfinder in his camera. "This place is orbing like crazy."
Dean glanced at the screen. "There's probably multiple spirits out and about," he observed.
"If these un-recovered bodies are causing the haunting..." Sam said, but Dean interrupted.
"Then we got to find them and burn them," Dean finished for him. "Just be careful, though. The only thing that makes me more nervous than a pissed off spirit? Is the pissed off spirit of a psycho killer."
Lynn made a noise of ill-concealed irritation from somewhere behind them, reminding them all of her presence. "You know, I don't understand why we didn't come back here when it was still light out," she grumbled. "We could have avoided all the homicidal ghosts of crazy people, had more light to find the missing bodies, and probably be done by now."
"Because Sam spent all day in the shrink's office," Dean retorted without skipping a beat, eyes still on his EMF reader.
Sam scoffed at him, clearly annoyed.
"Whatever," Jayne grunted from behind him. Dean looked over his shoulder at her and her stepsister, and found her already edging to the right instead of making the left he'd taken, moving down the opposite end of the hallway where they were standing. "I don't want to be here all night, so let's split up."
Sam nodded distractedly, but Dean frowned at her like she was crazy. "What?" he hissed. "No, no, no! Stay here!"
Both Jayne and Lynn frowned back at him, and Jayne gave him that slow, sarcastic, annoying blink. "Why?" Jayne asked shortly.
He had to admit, she kind of had him there. "Well… you know," Dean retorted anyway, gesturing around them. "Psycho spirits! All over the place!"
She gave him that blink again. "Huh. You don't say," she retorted, and then promptly went right back to ignoring him, speaking instead to Sam. "All right. Lynn and I will go that way, you two go the other way."
"Sounds like a plan," Sam agreed, still distracted and staring at the view-finder in the camera.
"No, it doesn't!" Dean exclaimed, looking at Sam like he'd lost it. "We should stay together!"
Jayne glowered at him. "Don't be an idiot," she growled. "There are four of us. We can make two groups of two, be just as safe as if we stuck together, and at the same time, cover way more ground. Now tell me you aren't too stupid to figure that out."
Dean narrowed his eyes at her, officially losing his patience. "You know what?" he snapped. "Fine! Go ahead! Get turned crazy! Get your ass killed! See if I care!"
"I'm glad we're on the same page!" she snapped back. "Come on, Lynn."
Jayne headed down the corridor in the opposite direction. Lynn stood still by Dean and Sam for a moment, looking caught in the headlights. She bit her lip awkwardly, looking from them to her stepsister and back again. "Um…" she said.
"Lynn!" Jayne barked.
Lynn jumped. "Well, you don't have to yell at me!" she shouted back.
"Are you coming or not?"
"Yeah, yeah," Lynn sighed, following her stepsister down the hall. The two of them disappeared into the darkness. Dean watched them leave, torn between anger and concern.
"Dude," Sam said. "Are we just going to stand here, or…"
"I'm going!" Dean cut him off angrily, stomping off down the corridor.
He heard Sam muttering something under his breath behind him, but Dean ignored him. They made their way down the pitch-black corridor, littered with trash from trespassing teenagers, and shone their flashlights into every corner, still using the EMF and camera viewfinder to watch for spirits. After navigating a few of the dark, twisty halls, edging past abandoned hospital beds and overturned wheelchairs, they came to an open room, cinderblock walls spackled with nasty black stuff. The room was filled with old, rusted hospital equipment. Dean ducked through an open door right inside the entrance, poking around what might have once been a supply closet, while Sam took the other side. He was fuming. As things stood, that woman was far more likely to drive Dean off the deep end than any of the angry spirits crawling around this place.
Ever since he'd gotten Janis running again, everything had to be a fight. For some reason, she was really pissed off that he'd helped her, and now he was pissed off too. She just would not let it go, giving him the silent treatment like she had in the beginning, throwing snide, sarcastic comments and bitchy looks his way. Now she wanted to traipse around a haunted asylum full of crazy ax-murdering ghosts alone just to prove that she could be as big a man as he could. She was... she was... well, in the words of her own stepsister, she was the worst.
He was not the bad guy here. Dean was ninety percent sure he'd done nothing wrong. He was just lending a helpful hand when needed, and now he was just exhibiting a little friendly concern. That hardly made him some kind of jerk. Hell, if anyone had a problem here, it was her.
"Dean!" Sam suddenly shouted from the other side of the room. "Dean! Shotgun!"
Dean spun around, tossing his bag on the floor and drawing his shotgun. He cringed at the sight of a short, squat, elderly woman advancing on Sam, her arms reaching out for him, with a face that looked like someone had taken a meat hammer to it.
"Sam, get down!" Dean ordered, aiming for the spirit's head.
Sam ducked. Dean fired. The ghost vanished in a cloud of smoke and salt.
Dean lowered the shotgun only slightly as he looked around the room in paranoia, half expecting to see another angry spirit charging towards them. Sam straightened up, glancing around just as frantically.
"That was weird," he announced breathlessly.
"You're telling me," Dean retorted, grabbing his bag and heading for the door.
"No, Dean, it was weird that she didn't try to attack me," Sam said, following after him.
Dean looked at him like he was crazy. Because, you know, he sounded crazy. "Looked pretty aggro from where I was standing."
"She didn't hurt me. She didn't even try! So if she didn't want to hurt me, then what did she want?"
Dean didn't get a chance to reply. A sound from inside the room they were currently passing startled them both, and they immediately fell silent. Sam turned on his flashlight, and Dean aimed the shot-gun into the room. Exchanging looks, the two brothers marched inside, headed straight for an old metal bed lying on its side. They approached it slowly, Dean holding the shotgun at the ready... and then Sam reached out and yanked the bed away from the wall.
A small blonde figure appeared behind the metal frame. She yelped in fright, spinning around and pressing herself into the corner. One look at her terrified face was all it took to confirm the petite blonde teenager was definitely human, and definitely alive.
Instantly, Dean felt bad. The young girl was scared out of her mind. He lowered the shotgun. "Hey," he whispered cajolingly, taking a step forward. The girl pressed herself even farther into the corner. "Hey, it's all right. It's all right. We're not going to hurt you." She barely looked slightly appeased, fisting her hands in the oversized sleeves of her long, pink sweater. "What's your name?" he asked.
The girl got slowly to her feet, shaking like a cornered rabbit. "Katherine," she whispered. "Kat."
"All right," Dean said, still trying to be soothing. "I'm Dean, this is Sam…"
"What are you doing in here?" Sam interrupted.
Kat's wide, frightened eyes darted from Dean to Sam, and back again. "M…my boyfriend. Gavin," she stuttered.
"Is he still here?" Dean demanded.
"Somewhere," Kat replied, still stuttering. "He thought it would be fun… to see some ghosts. I thought it was all pretend."
She was breathless, and Dean could see tears shining on her face. "I've seen things," she whispered, hugging her sweater closer around her chest. Her voice rose a notch or two. "I heard Gavin scream."
Dean glanced at Sam. Sam nodded, and they instantly sprang into action. "Look, Kat," Dean said, taking her by the hand and drawing her out of the corner. "Sam's going to get you out of here. I'll…"
"No," Kat protested, much louder than she'd spoken before this point. "No, I'm not leaving without Gavin. I'm coming with you."
"It's no joke around here," Dean argued with her. "It's dangerous."
"That's why I've got to find him," Kat replied.
For a moment, Dean just stared at Kat, and then he looked at his brother. Sam shrugged, clearly not going to be any help, and Dean sighed. He relented, against his better judgment, and announced, "Fine. I guess we'll just split up then."
Kat looked at him gratefully. Sam nodded, apparently willing to go with the plan, which sucked because Dean really didn't want to do it. Still gripping Kat's hand, Dean led her off in one direction, and Sam took the other, both of them intent on finding the missing teenager, and Dean steeling himself to have to protect Kat while he was at it. Hopefully, this Gavin kid was still alive.
And hopefully, Jayne and Lynn were having some success finding the missing bodies, or they were going to be here all freaking night.
It was creepily quiet in the abandoned asylum, and Jayne kept her shotgun on one hand, and the flashlight in the other, not willing to drop her guard for a moment. The further they crept into the South Wing, the darker it got, and the more disgusting it got. The place smelled like mold and decay, and there was something gross growing on the old walls. Old hospital beds and wheelchairs, and all sorts of other abandoned hospital equipment lined the halls and littered the rooms, most of it turned on its side or completely upside down.
"See anything?" Lynn asked in an unnecessarily loud stage whisper.
Jayne rolled her eyes and then glanced over her shoulder at her stepsister. Lynn was walking just a little bit behind her, swinging her flashlight side to side. For reasons beyond Jayne's comprehension, she hadn't taken out her shotgun, but Jayne chose not to comment on that. "Not yet," she replied. "You?"
Lynn shook her head. "Not a thing."
Jayne sighed, moving on ahead. "You know, for a haunted asylum, this place is pretty boring."
"Don't say that," Lynn retorted, on an aggravated sigh. "That's just asking for something to attack us."
Jayne snorted. "Yeah, well, I could do with a little excitement."
"Fine, then, but you go get attacked on your own time, thanks."
Jayne smirked at little at that, slowing to a stop in front of an old, battered white door. She pushed it open slowly, stepping cautiously into the pitch black room beyond, flashlight and shotgun at the ready. Somehow, she stupidly missed the obstacle right in front of her. Her boot caught something hard and fleshy, and with a muffled curse, Jayne toppled forward, stumbling over the object on the floor and dropping her flashlight. The light went out on impact.
She heard Lynn yelp and drop her flashlight too. It hit the ground with a loud clatter. "Jayne?" she exclaimed. "Are you ok? Jaynie!"
"I'm fine!" Jayne snapped, embarrassment making her irritable. "Get a grip. I just tripped over something."
She bent over and snatched up her fallen flashlight, giving it a good shake and switching it back on. Lynn moved closer to her side, retrieving her flashlight from the ground as well. Jayne shone her light on the floor in front of her... and tilted her head, frowning at the sight before her. "Holy crap," she grunted, her tone flat. "That's a dude."
"Oh my god," Lynn added, her voice going up a notch in concern. "I really hope he's not dead."
The dude was a young man, probably still in high school, with dark shaggy hair, wearing a flannel shirt under his brown corduroy jacket. He was also sprawled flat on his back on the floor, out cold. Jayne nudged him with her toe. "Hey!" she called at him. "Dude. You all right?"
Lynn rolled her eyes. "Are you serious?" she snapped at Jayne. "That is not how you wake up unconscious people!"
Jayne shrugged.
Sighing, Lynn knelt down beside the pale, prostrate teenager. "Hey," she hissed at him, shaking him by the shoulder. "Hey! Wake up, kid, come on!"
"Oh yeah," Jayne drawled. "That's way better."
"At least I didn't poke him with my shoe like he was road kill or something," Lynn retorted before returning the unconscious kid, gently slapping his face. "Hey! Come on, kid! I need you to wake up now!"
Slowly but surely, the boy started to come around. Blinking groggily, he frowned at the two women looming over him. "What…" he stuttered, squinting against the bright light from their flashlights. "What…?"
"Don't ask what happened," Jayne interrupted him gruffly. "Cause we don't know."
Lynn shot her stepsister an irritated look over her shoulder and then turned back to the teenager. "We're not going to hurt you," she assured him. "My name's Lynn. This is my stepsister Jayne. Are you all right?"
"I'm… I'm fine…" he stammered, sitting up slowly. He looked from Lynn to Jayne again. "I, uh… where's Kat?"
Jayne exchanged a look with her stepsister. "Who's Kat?" she asked the kid.
"My girlfriend," he replied. "She was here with me, I don't… I went off by myself because she was too scared and… and there was this girl…"
He swallowed hard. It looked as though he were stifling a gag.
"What girl?" Lynn asked.
"I don't know!" the kid practically shouted. "I… I think she was a ghost! I mean… her face… oh, god, it was horrible."
"Ok, kid, calm down," Jayne said dismissively, and Lynn gave her the Look.
"My name's Gavin," the teenager returned in annoyance.
"All right, Gavin," Lynn replied gently. "Where did you leave your girlfriend?"
"I'm… I'm not…" he swallowed and looked around him in confusion. "I'm not really sure. I just started running and then I must have tripped and fallen down or something, I…"
"Ok," Jayne cut him off. "This girl you saw. You think she was a ghost?"
"Yeah… her face…"
"What did she try to do to you?" Jayne asked.
"She… oh god, she kissed me!"
Jayne blinked. She exchanged another look with her stepsister and saw the same dubious reaction in Lynn's face. "She kissed you?" Jayne repeated.
"Yeah! It was disgusting!"
Jayne looked at Lynn again. Her stepsister seemed equally unimpressed. "But she didn't try to hurt you?" Lynn asked.
"Are you kidding me?" Gavin retorted. "She kissed me! I'm scarred for life!"
"Right," Jayne said shortly, cutting off what she anticipated to be a hysterical ramble. "Ok, kid. Lynn will show you the exit. I'll find your girlfriend. And both of you stay the hell out of here from now on, you hear me?"
"No," Gavin shook his head. "I can't leave without Kat."
"Oh, but you're going to."
"She's my girlfriend!"
"Jayne," Lynn said, turning large mournful eyes on her stepsister. "Maybe we could take the kid along. Help him find his girlfriend. And then get them both out of here."
"Maybe," Jayne retorted. "Or maybe we would work a lot faster without this idiot slowing us down."
"I'm standing right here," Gavin spoke up.
Jayne smirked. "I know where you are."
Lynn sighed, clearly losing her patience. Jayne would feel bad about it, if she wasn't already on the short end of her own. "We'll have to split up anyway," Lynn pointed out. "I'll take the kid, and you can go it alone."
Pursing her lips, Jayne thought about this option for a moment. She hated it, honestly. What she wanted to do was get the kid the hell out of here and finish her job with minimal interruptions. At the same time, she supposed it was unreasonable to think the kid would willingly leave his girlfriend.
"All right," she relented with a heavy sigh. "If you want to baby-sit, fine. He's with you. I'll keep going this way, and you take him back the way we came from."
Lynn nodded. "All right, sounds good. Come on, Gavin."
She gave the kid a shove in the right direction and the two of them disappeared around the door. Sighing again, Jayne watched them go. "And take out your damn shotgun!" she called after her stepsister.
Lynn's answering, put-upon sigh echoed through the asylum. "Fine, Mom!"
Jayne stared at the doorway Lynn had vanished through a moment longer. Then, still feeling a little uneasy, she pressed on through the darkness, and deeper into the asylum.
Sam picked his way through the eerie, not-quite-silent halls of the asylum, creeping sideways around old, decrepit furniture and equipment in the halls, and stepping over puddles and litter. He shone his flashlight into every corner and every room that he passed, eyes peeled for the missing teenager.
"Gavin!" he called. "Gavin!"
There was no answer.
Sighing, Sam continued on down the hall, calling out Gavin's name every once in awhile. The hairs on his neck were standing on end, and even though he'd yet to hear anything close by, or see any more ghosts, Sam was certain that he wasn't alone, and that the spirits were watching him. The feeling was enough to get him antsy on its own, but he was getting pretty irritated too. As much as he wanted to help the two teenagers who'd broken into the asylum, there was no denying the search for Gavin was wasting valuable time. All he could do was hope that Jayne and Lynn had already found some of the missing bodies.
"Gavin!" he called again.
"Sam!"
Sam froze, frowning ahead of him. He shone his flashlight down the hall, peering into the shadows at the end of the corridor. The voice was both feminine and familiar.
"Lynn?" he called back.
Sure enough, about three seconds later, he came face to face with Lynn's short, black haired figure as she stormed around the corner at the end of the hall. There was a flashlight in one of her hands, and a shotgun in the other, and a really frustrated expression on her face. Following close behind her was a pale, scrawny high school boy with dark shaggy hair.
"Hey," Sam greeted them. "I see you found Gavin."
Lynn frowned over her shoulder at the kid in question, and then returned her gaze to Sam. "Yeah, we did. I guess that means you and Dean found Kat."
"Yeah," Sam sighed. "She's with Dean. They're looking for him." He nodded at Gavin.
"We're looking for Kat," Lynn returned. "Jayne went off on her own to see if she could find the girl too."
"So that means nobody's found any of the missing bodies," Sam concluded.
"Nope," Lynn said. "Nobody's even looking for the missing bodies. We're going to be here all freaking night."
"Wait, you found Kat?" Gavin asked, pushing his way into the conversation.
"Yeah," Sam replied. "Your girlfriend's fine. We'll go find her and my brother, and then we'll get the two of you out of here."
Gavin breathed a sigh of relief. "You have no idea how awesome that sounds."
Actually, Sam knew exactly how awesome that sounded. He wished he was on his way out of the asylum too, but he knew all too well that he had several more long hours ahead of him in this dark, dank, musty place.
One more reason he was still pissed off about coming out to Rockford.
Dean shifted his bag higher on his shoulder and led the way through the dark, dank hallway, shining his powerful flashlight on the stretch of corridor just ahead of them. He didn't dare put away his shotgun. Kat hung close behind him, calling her boyfriend's name as they trekked along the quiet, dirty halls, past battered doors with peeling paint, long, broken glass windows that opened into pitch black rooms, and overturned, abandoned furniture.
He was annoyed. No, that was an understatement. He was majorly pissed off. They were wasting time, looking for this kid, and quite frankly, he had enough to do without baby-sitting Kat as well.
The tiny, frightened teenager was still calling her boyfriend's name. Dean stopped short, turning to face her, and she froze in the path.
"I got a question for you," he said. "You've seen a lot of horror movies, yeah?"
She shrugged, looking surprised by the question. "I guess."
"Do me a favor," Dean retorted, from behind clenched teeth. "Next time you go see one, pay attention. If someone says a place is haunted, don't go in."
Kat blinked, taken aback, but Dean didn't really care. He turned around again and continued the march down the hallway. But they only made it a little bit further before Dean felt the temperature drop a few degrees. Quickly, he handed Kat his flashlight and took hold of the shotgun in both his hands, aiming down the corridor ahead of them and ready to shoot. "Stay close," he ordered the kid.
She nodded, gripping the flashlight. Dean kept his shotgun at the ready and led the way around the corner. Then, suddenly, there was a loud crash in one of the rooms towards the end of the hallway. Both Kat and Dean jumped. A surprised scream echoed from down the hall – a surprised scream that did not come from Kat.
"Stay here," Dean snapped at Kat. He ran off towards the sound of the noise, certain the scream was either Jayne or her stepsister.
There was a loud shotgun blast from inside the room. Kat shrieked from her place down the hall. Dean kicked in the door and raced inside, just in time to see the swirling, fading smoke of an angry spirit on the receiving end of a rock salt filled shotgun shell.
He spun, looking for the source of the blast. Standing at the other end of the room, panting hard, was a tall blonde girl, expertly holding a shotgun in her hands.
"What the hell was that?" Dean demanded.
Still panting, Jayne turned away from where the spirit had just dissipated, and looked Dean in the eye. Instantly, her face hardened.
"What do you mean, what the hell was that?" she retorted. "I just blasted a ghost."
"What, are you alone?" he demanded, doing a circle and not seeing Lynn. "Where the hell's your sister?"
"What, are you alone?" she echoed back, just to be infuriating, he was sure. "Where's your brother?" Then she pushed past him, heading for the door, muttering, "Could have sworn he was the brains of the operation."
"Oh my god," Kat's voice sounded from the door about then, and both he and Jayne looked up in surprise, zeroing in on the clearly frightened teenager. Kat stood in the doorway with her shoulders hunched, clutching the flashlight to her chest like a security blanket. Dean glared at her.
"Didn't I tell you to stay put?" he demanded in annoyance.
"Are you Kat?" Jayne asked the high school student, gentler than he would have expected, and he chalked that up to her purposely being infuriating as well.
She nodded her shiny blonde head. "Uh-huh," she stammered out, pressing herself against the doorframe. "How... how did you…?"
"I'm Jayne," she interrupted. "My stepsister and I found your boyfriend. He's with her, looking for you."
"Great," Dean snapped. "Where are they?"
Jayne shrugged. "We split up."
"You split up?!" Dean exclaimed angrily.
Jayne stared at him like he was some sort of moron. "Yeah," she returned, slowly and smartly. "Why?"
"Are you freaking kidding me?" he snapped. "Pissed off spirits of psycho killers? Ring any bells?"
Jayne shrugged again. "You and Sam split up."
"That's not the same thing!"
"Sure it is," she retorted, and then she turned her back on him and headed for Kat. "Let's get out of here, Kat."
She took the girl by the shoulder, steering her out of the room and back up the hall, and Kat seemed perfectly happy to let her. That annoyed Dean too. Everything Jayne-related annoyed him. "Fine, it's the same thing!" he spat at her back, wishing he had something better to fire at her. "Quit acting like everything's cool, though, because that spirit almost got the drop on you! Right?"
"You know something? I am so not in the mood for your shit!" Jayne barked at him over her shoulder, her voice echoing in the corridor, and he figured that just meant he was right. "I can take care of myself, damn it, alone in here or otherwise! No one asked you to swoop in and play hero!"
She turned her back on him again, pushing Kat along as she stormed down the hallway, and Dean chuckled meanly at her back. "Well, now we're getting to the real problem, aren't we?"
"What the hell are you on about now?"
"This is about me fixing your damn truck, isn't it?" he snapped at her.
"No, this is about you being a dick!" she shot back.
"You guys?" Kat stammered nervously. "Um… maybe yelling in the haunted asylum isn't really the best idea."
Both hunters blinked at the teenager. Dean tilted his head to the side, acknowledging the well made point.
"Who asked you?" Jayne retorted, and then she was marching back down the hall. Kat looked as terrified of her as she was of the ghosts, but she followed Jayne anyway.
"So, how exactly am I being a dick?" he demanded, following after the two of them.
"You know exactly what you're doing!"
"You know, I really don't think I do," he returned. "Actually, I'm pretty sure I'm not a dick! Actually, I'm pretty sure you're a crazy bitch!"
"I'm pretty sure no one cares what you think!"
"Well, why don't we get a second opinion!" Dean snapped. "Hey, Kat, let's say you drive a rusted old piece of shit and it dies on the side of the road!" Jayne froze and gave him the darkest glower over her shoulder he'd seen in a while. He probably should have taken that as a sign to stop, but he didn't. "And let's say you have a friend who drives out to help you when you're stranded, and he gets your piece of shit running again? Would you call that guy a dick?"
Kat looked torn, biting her lip and folding her long sweater tightly over her chest again. "Um..." she stuttered. "Uh... I don't... well, I guess... no?"
Jayne glared at him again, and Dean smirked triumphantly at her. "See that?" he said. "No."
"You weren't there," Jayne informed Kat, and then she took the teenager by the shoulder again and continued storming down the hallway.
"And let's say this guy simply shows a little friendly concern about you while you're wandering around in a spooky, dangerous place," Dean went on as they walked, unwilling to let it go. "Does that make him a dick?"
It was Kat who stopped this time, frowning at him, and then Jayne, and then at him again. "Well... I don't... you did act like she and her... her stepsister?" Jayne nodded, and Kat continued. "Like they couldn't split up in here... but you and Sam did, so... I mean... maybe..."
"Maybe he's a dick?" Jayne supplied, and now she was the one smirking triumphantly.
"Well... maybe... I don't... you know, I don't really want to be involved," Kat finished quickly, and then she started walking at a brisk pace down the long, dark, moldy corridor again. Jayne gave him another infuriating, half a smirk, and then jogged after the kid.
Dean's temper got the best of him again. "Fine!" he exploded. "And you know what? If another crazy psycho killer comes after you, I'll just stand there and watch!"
"Sounds like a good idea to me!"
"Um…" Kat murmured uncertainly. "Like... again... maybe you guys shouldn't be...?"
"Yeah, yeah," Dean interrupted her rudely, stomping between her and Jayne, and then resuming his place at the forefront. "We're coming, and we're being quiet."
After Sam had reunited with Lynn, and subsequently found the missing Gavin, he took up the lead as they all headed back, retracing his steps to where he'd left Dean and Kat. Sam kept the hallway before them illuminated by the glow of his flashlight as they made their way towards the exit. The hallway was just as dark, stinky, and gross as it had been when he was coming from the other direction, and Sam still felt that creepy-crawly sensation of being watched.
"We need to get you and your girlfriend out of here," he heard Lynn saying as they made their way through the halls. "There's no telling what might be roaming around in this place."
"Yeah," Gavin agreed, his voice a notch too high, giving him a hysterical sound. "Like horny ghost girls with jacked up faces!"
Lynn made a strange noise in the back of her throat, and Sam could tell she was annoyed. "Right," she said tightly. "Like that."
"That was quite possibly the single most horrifying experience of my life."
Lynn made that funny noise again. "Wish I could say the same."
"I mean… ew! She freaking kissed me!"
"Trust me," Lynn growled. "Really could have been worse."
Gavin scoffed. "How?"
"Oh, I don't know!" Lynn snapped. "She could have killed you?"
"Wait," Sam said suddenly, as the full impact of the conversation finally hit him, and he stopped short and turned around. "You saw a ghost?"
Gavin nodded, his eyes wide. "It was disgusting," he informed Sam, in the deadly serious, yet somehow ridiculous tone that only a teenager could manage.
"And she kissed you?" Sam pressed, ignoring Gavin's remark.
Gavin nodded again.
"But she didn't try to hurt you?"
The high school kid shook his head.
Sam glanced at Lynn, who shrugged and rolled her eyes. "I know," she told him. "Kids, right? Like it was the end of the world or something."
"I saw a ghost earlier too," Sam announced. "Same thing – well, not the kissing part. She looked like she wanted to tell me something."
Lynn frowned at him. "Like what?"
Sam shrugged at her and turned to Gavin again. "This girl. Did she try to tell you anything?"
Gavin shrugged too, screwing up his face. "Well… she did kind of try to whisper something in my ear…"
"What?" Sam demanded.
The kid looked at him like he was nuts. "I don't know. I ran like hell."
Sam turned to Lynn in excitement. "These spirits, they're not trying to hurt us!" he exclaimed. "At least, not the ones we've been seeing. Something else is going on, something else is in here… something besides the patients."
"Like what?" Lynn asked again. "I mean, are you saying these crazy people ghosts are actually trying to warn us about something?"
"Yeah," Sam replied, nodding. "That's exactly what I'm saying."
Lynn sighed, chewing her lip. "I don't know, Sam…"
"What do you mean, you don't know?" he practically pounced on her, desperate for confirmation. "You believed me in Lawrence, even when Dean and Jayne and Missouri thought the poltergeist was gone! You believed me about my dreams! Why won't you believe me now?"
"I didn't say I didn't believe you!" Lynn defended herself. "I'm sure you have a good theory, I'm just not so sure if it makes total sense. I mean, the patients are the ones who rioted. They were the ones with the motive, the ones most likely to be angry…"
Sam interrupted her with a loud, harsh sigh. "Well, I don't know, ok? We just have to find out more about this place! More about the riot, maybe!"
He searched her eyes, seeking for reassurance, for faith. He got reluctance.
"Let's just find the others," Lynn said. "We'll work out this theory once we're all back together. All right?"
Sam's lip curled with disappointment. "Fine."
Lynn turned, stealing his lead, and guided the two men down the corridor. Sam sighed again and followed her.
"Dude," Gavin said to him, in an undertone. "Can you say whipped?"
Sam looked over his shoulder at the kid, eyes narrowed in annoyance, and opened his mouth to make a smart remark of his own... but he didn't get the chance, because that was when they heard the screams.