*glances over shoulder* How the feck did this get so long?
Anyway. Thanks for the favourites, follows and reviews. *tips hat* Ta.
8:35 AM
~50~ Ashes
The Impala rumbled up to the gates of Corvus Manor for the third and final time. Sam and Garth were waiting, sitting casually on the tailgate of an old Ford pickup. They waved as though nothing extraordinary had happened in the past twelve hours and they were just meeting up with a few buddies for drinks.
Dean pushed open the squeaky door and stepped out of the Impala, nodding once to his brother and friend before going around and helping Lilly out of the passenger side. She pretended to huff about it but accepted the aid nonetheless, gazing up at the iron gates, and at the mansion beyond.
"Ugly as I remember it."
Sam and Garth slipped off the tailgate of the pickup, the latter relieving Dean of Lilly's elbow to allow the brothers a moment.
Sam and Dean stood before one another, a quick scan checking for less obvious damage. A brief phone call had been adequate in ensuring the other was still kicking, but only a face to face brought peace of mind.
Sam bobbed his chin. "Hey."
"Hey," said Dean. He sniffed. "You stink."
Sam looked down at himself, caked with bog mud, then back up, half smiling. Dean remained deadpan but he grasped Sam's offered forearm and pulled him into a brief man-hug, shoulder to shoulder, arm pounding each other's back.
"Ready?"
"Let's do this."
Agnes, it seemed, had finally remembered enough to take down her wards before joining her new avian posse. Dean stepped up to the gates and snipped the padlock's shackle with bolt cutters, dragging the chain away and casting it aside. The gates shrieked as he pushed them open. Grabbing a pair of jerrycans and a knapsack from the trunk, he followed the others up the long, white-gravelled walkway to the manor.
Lilly and Garth had no issues stepping onto the portico and to the front door, but both Sam and Dean hesitated. They'd just made it out of there. Why the hell would they want to go back in?
Garth looked back. "Hey, if you can't do this, I can handle it—"
Dean scowled and marched up the steps, shouldering him aside. "Don't coddle us, okay? We're fine. Sam."
The younger hunter took his cue, moving to stand by Dean's side. And together, they threw themselves at the door, shoulder first. Ancient wood splintered and the portal swung open. Before he could scare himself again, Sam stepped inside, clicking on a flashlight.
Everything looked the same. Dustier, more worn, and brighter in the morning light, but it was definitely the same foyer.
The others filed in after him, Dean coming to stand beside him with his scowl still in place. Both looked down and saw the same thing at the same time. The grandfather clock, lying on its face, in the same position they'd left it before leaving the Collective Unconscious.
The brothers looked to each other. Sam opened his mouth, but stayed his tongue as Dean raised a finger.
"Don't you say a word." He turned away, leaving his brother to stare at the clock a while longer.
"Alright." Dean picked up the knapsack and zipped it open, pulling out canisters of salt and lighter fluid. "No fast way of doing this. Going to have to go through every room. Salt every bone you find and give it a shot of fire juice. If you want to help, Lilly, best stay on this floor..."
It took the rest of the morning, and it was a surreal experience for Sam and Dean. They each visited the rooms they'd woken up in when this all began, just for kicks. For Dean, in the second floor guest room the bed was unmade, the wardrobe doors open. For Sam, the footlocker was empty in the servant's bedroom, and it was definitely big enough for him to fit inside. Not that he tested it. And these weren't the only parallels.
The piano was in pieces in the middle of the music hall. There was a scattered game of chess in the sun room. Tea sets were still waiting on the tables in the parlour. In the kids' bedroom were bone jacks waiting to be picked up off the floor. It looked like a whirlwind had gone through the trophy room, taxidermy and displays smashed and knocked off the walls.
But the brothers weren't there to contemplate the parallels between the real world and the Collective Unconscious. They were here to ensure that everyone had gone to rest, whether they wanted to or not.
Thanks to Agnes' wards, the building had been well preserved, even from the weather. Unfortunately, so had the victims of the Corvus massacre. Without insects or vermin to consume the bodies, they had mummified, and not even their clothes had rotted away. It wasn't difficult to see how each of them had died. Some were still clutching the hilts of their murder weapons, or grasping the wounds that killed them.
From top to bottom, the hunters scoured the manor, salting and squirting lighter fluid on every body. Their EMF metres picked up nothing, but it never hurt to be certain. When they glanced out the windows overlooking the back property, they saw Garth breaking into the family crypt, adjacent to the small chapel a few hundred feet away from the manor. There, the remains of Atticus Corvus and the family members who died before the massacre would be taken care of.
Finally, there was one more place for them to investigate. And neither looked forward to it.
"Need me to hold your hand?"
Sam rolled his eyes, stepping before Dean and opening the cellar door. It stank, but not alarmingly so. He led the way down, the beam of the flashlight tracing along the walls.
He wasn't really sure what to expect when he reached the bottom. Bones. Dead roots. Even crates or barrels. But all he found were boards, lying where the well was supposed to be.
"Sam, check this out." Dean was aiming his light at the wall. Sam squinted, then walked over, running his fingers along gouges in the mortared stones.
"Claw marks."
"...Huh. Well, I think we're done here." Dean turned, marching up the stairs.
Sam watched him go, then glanced over his shoulder at the blocked well. Perhaps he imagined it—in fact he must have—but he could have sworn he heard a tiny knock coming from that well...
Sam followed his brother, joining Garth and Lilly in the foyer. Dean had snatched up one of the jerrycans, twisting off the cap.
"Alright. Let's burn this motherhumper down."
Fumes began to fill the manor, and both Garth and Lilly retreated before Sam and Dean, who dumped the last drops of fuel from the jerrycans on the foyer's rug before backing out the front door. Dean flipped up the cap of a Zippo and flicked a flame to life. He held it out to Lilly.
"We wouldn't have made it without you—"
But she was already shaking her head. "I did not endure the nightmare you boys did. This is your beast to slay."
Dean offered it to Garth, who raised his hands in refusal. Sam simply looked amused as Dean turned to him.
"Dude, I ganked the demon. You get the honours."
"Was hoping you'd say that." Dean grinned and didn't even look as he threw the Zippo sideways, into the manor's gullet. A hungry glow expanded quickly as they retreated down the walkway, not looking back until they were off the grounds.
While Garth helped Lilly into the passenger seat of his pickup, Sam and Dean watched the hellish glow filling the manor's innards. The outer walls were stone, but when the wooden supports were consumed with flames, eventually it would all crumble.
"...Why'd we do that? Didn't even get a flicker of EMF."
Dean shrugged. "Some things are better forgotten. 'Sides, the demon was loose in there once. Place is contaminated."
"Hey, guys."
They turned to see Garth. He was wringing his hands.
"So," he said.
"So," said Dean.
Garth shuffled. "Thanks. You guys didn't have to help me with this."
"Yeah, we did," said Sam. "It's what friends do."
His face glowed at the word friends. "Oh, you guys." He opened his arms, and the brothers glanced at each other with a look before succumbing to the inevitable, returning Garth's embraces. He gave them each an extra squeeze before stepping out of their personal bubbles.
"Well, I'm gonna drive Lilly home." He glanced back, and the old woman waved from the truck. The brothers waved back. "Keep her company for a while. She says she makes a mean cup of chamomile."
Sam smiled, glancing at his feet. "Take care of yourself, Garth."
He beamed. "You too, Sam."
"Hey, Garth," said Dean. "Next time we meet, you're buying the beers."
He pointed at him. "Gotcha covered, bud."
The brothers watched until Garth climbed into his pickup, backed up, and headed off, honking twice. They waved as he drove around the bend and was lost from sight.
"Aaah." Dean's hand slapped against his leg as he dropped it. "That guy's really something."
"Could say that again." Sam turned and made his way over to Impala's passenger side, Dean mirroring him on the driver's. He paused.
"Hey, I've been thinking—"
"Don't even want to know what you're thinking right now, Sam. I'm tired, I'm hungry. We need to jump town and find a hotel so I can crash, man."
"Wait, Dean, just hold on a moment. You know how those ghosts kept trying to possess guys like us, to get to our bodies in the real world? Well...what if they knew?"
Dean frowned. "About what?"
"About..." Sam gestured, his reflection warped on the roof of the Impala. "What had happened. Yeah, they were all insane, but they knew enough to leave clues for us to follow. What if they knew Agnes was trying to help from the outside world, but because she kept forgetting herself, they wanted to get out here to help her remember?"
Dean's frown deepened, then his eyebrows flew up his forehead. "Dunno. Don't really care either. It's over. Let it go."
Sam opened his mouth, but before he could speak, a shadow passed overhead and he glanced up.
"Awk!"
A crow landed on the car roof between them, cocking its head this way and that, acting very birdlike. And yet, not. The brothers stared at it, then at each other.
"...Agnes?"
The crow looked at Sam, blinked.
"Um...thanks."
"More like you're welcome," Dean grumbled.
The bird turned to him with what could almost be a withering stare, and then took off, leaving a very obvious present behind. Dean glared at the spatter of white on the obsidian paint job, then up at the sky at the ascending avian.
"Bitch."
Sam snorted with laughter, then rapped his fingertips against the roof. "Come on, let's get out of here." He opened the door and slipped inside.
Dean grumbled under his breath but followed suit, turning the key in the ignition. The old cat rumbled to life, headlights flaring with anticipation of the next hunt. Gravel spat from beneath her wheels as she bore her charges away.
"We should get cheeseburgers."
Dean glanced at his brother as though he'd suddenly grown a horn in the middle of his forehead. "Dude. Since when have you ever craved cheese or burgers?"
"...So what? I dunno, I just feel like a cheeseburger."
Not willing to bypass the chance for good grub, Dean just shook his head and popped on the radio. He tuned it to a rock station and left it, ignoring Sam's look for almost a minute. Finally—
"What?"
"Dean, this is Vince Vincente."
"So?"
"You hate Vince Vincente."
"Yeah, well maybe I've grown an ear for him, you know how it is."
"Since when? Since, oh, a few hours ago?"
Dean's glare was dangerous. "It isn't what you think it is."
Sam simply returned the look with raised eyebrows. "Fine. Whatever helps you sleep at night."
"...But if I ever try to order a salad with extra kale, slap me."
He smiled. "Will do."
The brothers fell into silence, content to enjoy each others' company as the Impala found the highway and hit it hard, knowing there was a long way to go yet, and no one, not even fate, knew how far it went.
~Epilogue~
12:59 AM
Something woke him. Perhaps it was a car in need of a muffler. Perhaps it was the mini fridge humming to life. Perhaps it was something else.
Sam stirred, front down on his motel bed, facing the wall. The sheets were a mess around him, the pillow indented from his face. He raised his head, trying to make out the weird shadow on the tacky, puke yellow and maroon wallpaper before him.
Mouth sticky, he ran his tongue along his gums and rolled the other way to find the source of the shadow. He froze. Dean was sitting on the edge of his bed, a dark silhouette, facing Sam.
He opened his mouth to speak, but words caught like dry cockleshells in his throat as Dean raised his head, strips of blue light catching the side of his face from between Venetian blinds. He smiled. And then he opened his eyes, two ochre orbs riddled with black pupils.
Sam gasped awake, bolting upright. A triangle of sweat soaked his shirt around the collar, and he was sucking in air as though he'd nearly suffocated. He looked to Dean in the other bed, but he was asleep, body straight as a soldier's, as was his wont. Peaceful.
Brow creased, Sam punched his pillow into submission and nestled back down, only to roll over onto his side, his back to Dean. It was with trouble he returned to sleep, face lined with unease, for words had begun to whisper through his mind, over and over, and he could not banish them.
"You will not forget me, Winchester. You will never forget me..."
Spη
